


Trust Falls and Probability Exercises

by kittykatthetacodemon



Series: Luck of the Draw [3]
Category: The Magnificent Seven (2016)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, M/M, Post-Canon, Slow Build, Superpowers, like the slowest of slow builds
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-11-03
Updated: 2016-12-04
Packaged: 2018-08-28 19:45:54
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 8
Words: 57,403
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8460646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kittykatthetacodemon/pseuds/kittykatthetacodemon
Summary: "Immediately, he realized that his hands were tied together in front of him, with barely an inch of give to the rope, and that there was a lingering pain that suggested he had been hit hard on the back of the head.  It matched nicely with the throbbing ache in his leg, one that didn’t fade even when he managed to straighten it underneath him.  More importantly, his guns, belt, hat, and cards were all gone.
Great.  Fantastic.  Someone was definitely going to get shot for this."
Or, a post-canon AU where nobody died and also they have superpowers.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> A lot of what's coming won't make much sense if you haven't read the first part of the series.
> 
> ART BY [RageBear](http://archiveofourown.org/users/RageBear/pseuds/RageBear)

Faraday woke slowly, head reeling like he was coming off a wild night, except he couldn’t remember having enough whiskey for anything of the sort.  They’d been wandering south-westerly, edging toward the Mexican border, and it’d been ages since he’d seen a town big enough for a general store, let alone a saloon, let alone any place to refill his little bottle.  If that was his first clue that something quite right, his second was the sheer noise of it all: they weren’t particularly quiet folk, but here there was more noise than any seven men could easily manage out in the open.  He scrunched his face up into a frown.

It was also bitterly cold, and the ground was hard where he was lying, tucked forward in an uncomfortable twist of limbs.  Slowly, he tried to sit up, groggy and confused, and it was the sharp bite of pain from his bad leg that finally catapulted him fully awake—it had never quite fully healed after Rose Creek, even with Doc’s best efforts at speeding along the healing, and he could never forget it.

Immediately, he realized that his hands were tied together in front of him, with barely an inch of give to the rope, and that there was a lingering pain that suggested he had been hit hard on the back of the head.  It matched nicely with the throbbing ache in his leg, one that didn’t fade even when he managed to straighten it underneath him.  More importantly, his guns, belt, hat, and cards were all gone.

Great.  Fantastic.  Someone was definitely going to get shot for this.

He groaned and finally dragged his eyes open, only to immediately wish that he hadn’t.  There was a camp around him, just like there’d been when he’d gone to sleep the night before, but rather than a tight circle of seven men and their horses around a scraggly little fire, there were probably thirty men pressed up close together, none of them the least bit familiar.  He rolled his head a little, and instead of the open sky overhead, he found a low-hanging stretch of rock, like the roof of a cave.  A little way off, there was the hint of light from a fire, an evening sunset; that was probably just outside the cave mouth, then, where the smoke wouldn’t gather and choke them all.

He maybe stared a little.  “What the hell,” he said, mouth cotton-dry and flat with shock.

It’d been some months since they’d left Rose Creek, and the seven of them had spent much of their time wandering, taking a little time for rest and recuperation before jumping straight back into gunfights and quick-draw competitions.  Faraday especially had been doing his best to convince the others that he was _fine_ , really and truly fine—sure, he’d been dead, but only a little, and only for a matter of minutes.  He was alive now, thanks to Miss Emma, and he didn’t much appreciate the awkward gentle way they were all treating each other still, and him in particular.  (Maybe Goody was that way with Billy, too, though Billy was a master of staring anyone and anything into submission.  In comparison, Faraday’s usual strategy of misdirection seemed to be falling short.)  It was honestly unbelievable: in the week between meeting each other and getting up close and personal with a Gatling gun, Faraday was pretty sure they’d killed more men between them than the original population of Rose Creek.  None of them were _soft_.

He was fine.  He was, even if nobody quite believed it.

To be honest, even he had to doubt that a little when shit like this kept happening.

He had no clue where he was, or how he might have gotten there.  This looked like a smuggler’s cave, if he had to guess, which meant these were probably bandits of some sort.  And if he wasn’t mistaken, the men nearest him weren’t speaking English; the Mexican language didn’t mean a thing to him, but he wasn’t so stupid that he didn’t know it when he heard it.  He found himself wishing, maybe for the first time, that he’d bothered to learn more than was needed to ask for a drink and insult a man’s mother.  But, no—he squashed that down as soon as it occurred to him.  Somewhere, somehow, Vasquez had caught the edges of the thought and was laughing at him, he just knew it.

And—shit.

Damn if that didn’t sober him right up.  Where were the others?  They had all been there when he’d gone to sleep, but from his position on the floor, he couldn’t see any one man that he recognized even faintly.  The most obvious answer—that they were all dead—he could reject out of hand.  Sam Chisolm was a man who woke, gun ready, at the slightest sound and at even the faintest smell of blood, and the others slept just as light even without the same heightened senses. There was no way they’d all slept through trouble, which led to the disappointing realization that _he_ must have, if nothing else.  He groaned again, imagining all the shit he’d get for this, but only managed to finally catch the attention of one of the idiots who’d captured him.

“Evening,” Faraday greeted, somewhat politely, his hands twitching slightly against the ropes in a bid for freedom that wasn’t coming.  The man nudged his buddies to catch their attention and then stalked toward him, and Faraday reminded himself that it never paid to antagonize a fellow right off, especially when he was tied up and at a definite disadvantage.  “Thank you kindly for the pleasure of your hospitality this—erm—fine evening, but if you wouldn’t mind untying me…”

The man reached him and dropped into a squat next to him, studying him with narrow, dark eyes.  Faraday let his gaze flicker from him up to his companions, who were beginning to leer in a way that made his guts crawl, and then back down.  The man met his eyes squarely, and said something in a burst of Mexican that escaped Faraday entirely.

“English, anyone?” he said hopefully.  It wasn’t entirely a useless thought; he’d known several folks with a gift for languages.

But the man just frowned, the movement tugging at a twisted scar high up on his hairline.  It was a strikingly unpleasant expression.  Scar let out another rapid stream of Mexican, and this time Faraday recognized just enough to know he was being insulted, among other things.

“Hey,” he snapped, and rocked forward against the ropes in an involuntary twitch toward guns that weren’t even there.  “No need for that—”

Scar didn’t appreciate his tone, apparently, since he leaned back on his heels and reached out a hand.  Faraday jerked back, but there was nowhere to go—and then his hand hit Faraday’s arm and there was pain, racing out from that point and exploding in his chest, tightening around his lungs.  Faraday choked and arched up from the ground, limbs twitching uselessly, nerves and muscles firing at random—he wished he had the breath to shout—

As quickly as it’d come, it stopped.  Faraday gasped for air while the ones watching started to laugh.  “Hell of a power, mister,” he said, like his bravado meant anything, and bared his teeth at Scar and his friends.  Scar, laughing himself, kicked out twice—ribs and face, and Faraday shouted at that, curling in on himself and bringing up his bound hands to find that his nose was bleeding, though hopefully not broken.

Faraday snarled out a couple of curses.  They ignored him, and moved off and away toward the exit, hooting and calling to each other as they went.

That was it, he decided; that was the last straw.  No way was he waiting for the rest of the seven to come get him.  He was rescuing his own damn self, and, if at all possible, he was taking these assholes with him.

If he had to lie on the floor and recover for a bit before that, well, there was no one around to judge him for it.

* * *

First things first: he went for the knife in his boot.

He typically had more knives than that, since it was hard to spend any time around Billy Rocks without developing an appreciation for a good sharp blade, but it seemed that he’d been stripped of all the more obvious weapons.  The one he had left to him was small but wickedly sharp, nothing more than a pig-sticker, but it seemed luck had been with him during whatever search he’d gone through—it would do just fine, for this.  The rope split easy enough after some careful back-and-forth, and he sliced through it most of the way until he was nothing more than a hard yank and twist away from freedom.  In other words, he looked trapped as ever, but he could get out any time he chose.

The knife went back into his boot.

It was a good thing that the bandits weren’t paying him much mind.  Nobody so much as glanced in his direction, like he was a living piece of furniture rather than a captive.  He shifted, trying to get his leg around and under him to see if it could bear his weight—the answer seemed to be probably, maybe—and that got him some lazy interest, but when he settled back down with his back against the rocky wall, they just let him be and went back to what they had been doing.

So he wouldn’t be able to just stand up and walk out, but they wouldn’t pay him any mind otherwise.  Fine.

Well, he was no Billy Rocks, and one knife alone wasn’t going to cut it against a roomful of men with guns.  It was no use trying to con them if they didn’t speak English, either, as he’d learned from long and often painful experience.  His own gift wasn’t much use in a situation like this, either, excepting maybe to tip the odds in his favor a little.  That meant waiting for nightfall, and hoping they slept heavy.  If he was lucky, nobody’d have any gifts that might alert them to an escape attempt.

“Lord, grant me patience,” he said to himself, rolling his eyes toward the ceiling.  They both knew he didn’t have much of his own.

* * *

It was hours before anything happened worth noting, and by then he had cooled off enough to recognize that he wouldn’t be killing every man in this cave with him, no matter how appealing the thought seemed.  As time passed, a few men got up and left, most presumably to gather supplies; they all came back soon enough, with jugs of water or animal carcasses draped over their shoulders.  One man came back just after true dark with a small sack, which caused some excitement—Faraday’s friend with the scar got up and dealt with that himself, opening it and pulling out a stack of folded papers that he looked over while the others buzzed around him.  Eventually he barked something, shoved about half of the papers back into the sack, tossed it back at the man who’d brought it, and then stalked out of the cave into the night.  Outside, hooves pounded away: it seemed that whatever it was needed dealing with immediately.

Interesting.

Someone eventually came over and gave him a ladleful of water, a mouthful of bread.  Faraday took it silently, keeping the fraying edges of the rope tucked out of sight.

Soon enough, the group settled down to sleep.  Most moved back further into the cave, settling on bedrolls and blankets in small clumps.  There was some commotion between a group of four men at the front, a bit of shouting that he couldn’t understand, and then two of them moved back and dropped onto their own blankets while the other two picked up their rifles and put on their hats.  One of those two was the man with the sack of letters.

They’d set up a guard rotation, then.  From the way they were settling, the one with the letters just inside the cave mouth and the other just outside past the fire, they were keeping an eye out for anyone moving in.  They weren’t prepared so much for anyone trying to head out.

He waited.

Slowly, noise in the cave died down.  Men settled into sleep.  When the first few started snoring, Faraday started to shift slowly, loosening up muscles that had tightened.  After a while, he made some quiet noises, just to see if anyone would react.  The guard inside the cave didn’t as much as twitch.  A man nearby shifted, but settled quickly enough, and that was it, that was the best he was going to get.

The ropes snapped easily, like he knew they would.  He shook his hands free and rubbed his wrists, getting the blood flowing, and pushed himself to his feet.

“Damn,” he said, quiet as a breath, and almost folded back to the ground when his leg tried to give out.  He kneaded the stiff muscle with both hands, but it’d been stuck under him at a bad angle for hours and it hurt like hell.

There was no time to baby it.  He clenched his teeth and got going.

He went slow, moving as quietly as he knew how as he stepped past sleeping bodies and over outstretched limbs.  As much as he could, he kept to the cave wall, keeping himself behind the guard to make sure he wouldn’t catch any movement from the corner of his eye.  Eventually, he dropped to a crouch.  About six feet back he paused, checked that everyone around was still good and asleep, and went for the knife in his boot.

The first guard died silently, without even fighting the hand Faraday had clamped over his mouth and noise to keep him quiet.  Faraday carefully lowered the body, leaning it up against the cave wall in a way that might pass if nobody took too close a look.  After a moment’s thought, he went rifling through the man’s pockets, digging out the sack of letters.  The truly interesting stuff had probably gone with Scar, but there might be something worth finding left behind.

He tucked it into his own shirt, and glanced over to the other guard.

The man didn’t seem to have noticed a thing.  On the far side of the fire, he was facing out and completely oblivious to anything behind him.

Faraday straightened up, knife in hand, and started toward him.

He might not have been as careful as he ought to have been, or maybe the man had a little bit of something extra to warn against danger.  Whatever the case, at the last moment, the man noticed something and jerked around.  Faraday immediately tackled him, knocking the breath out of him before he could shout for help.  They wrestled for a bit, struggling back and forth across the dirt, only barely keeping clear of the fire.

After a bit of a scuffle, Faraday managed to get the upper hand.  The man grunted, fumbled in the dirt, and came up swinging—the rock in his hand cracked against Faraday’s temple, and it was sheer gut instinct that made him swing his knife down before he went reeling into the dirt.  Stars temporarily obscured his vision, but he felt it when the man’s body jerked and went still.

He gave himself a moment to gather his wits.  When his eyesight cleared, he saw that he had managed to slip his knife in between the ribs, against all odds—the man was very, very dead.

All that fuss had probably caused a bit more noise than he’d wanted—probably enough to wake someone up— though not enough to cause immediate alarm.  Quickly, he yanked his knife free and wiped it clean on the guard’s clothes, since he wasn’t about to complain about the mess.  A little less quickly, he managed to drag himself to his feet.

Something caught his eye, and he paused, taking a closer look at the pile lying by the second guard’s body.  Was that…?

It was.  The man had taken his damn hat.  With a scowl, he snatched it up and dropped it on his head.  The guns around the guard’s waist weren’t his, his deck of cards was nowhere to be seen, and the ammo situation was atrocious, but something was better than nothing.  He snatched those up too, and stumbled away into the night.

It was overcast outside, dim and hard to see, and windy enough to stir up the dust and cover any tracks he might make.  That was to his advantage.  He was walking about as well as a wounded calf, though, which was not.  Without a chance to rest up, he wasn’t going to make it far.

At any moment, someone in that cave would come exploring and find the bodies.  He needed to get gone before then.

So he moved, because he had to move.  The cliff wall worked well enough to prop him up, and he got started on dragging himself away, stumbling as he went and trying to ignore the beginnings of noise and confusion behind him as someone started shouting.  There had to be cover somewhere nearby, even if all he could see so far was dirt, dust, and scrub.  Way, way out, he caught the glimmer of lights that might be a town, but there was no chance he’d reach that on foot before someone saw. 

He was so busy looking away that he didn’t notice the hole in the damn wall until he’d tripped and fallen right through it.

Hitting the ground with a startled oomph and a groan, he gave himself a moment to gather his breath before rolling over and figuring out what the hell had happened.  He found himself in an alcove in the cliff face, narrow and rocky, the entrance almost completely hidden from view by the springy scrub brush he had fallen through.  It was small, but also long enough that he could stretch out his bum leg when he propped himself against the back wall, like it had been made just for him.  With the toe of his boot, he nudged the scrub more fully into place, hiding him away completely.

Convenient.  Unlikely, but convenient.  He’d take it.

The men were shouting louder, now, cries of alarm beginning to move off out of the cave and into the night, but he didn’t hear any dogs barking, so they didn’t have much chance of tracking him down unless someone had a troublesome knack for finding things.  But as far as hiding places went, this wasn’t bad.  One thing was for sure: nobody ever expected a man would be stupid enough to hide from his captors less than thirty feet from the place of his captivity.

Good enough.

His head was still ringing from the third hard blow he had taken in the past few days, and there was an uncomfortable sticky wetness up by his temple and under his hat that made him think he was bleeding, but his vision wasn’t doubled and he could still remember his own name.

Like he said: good enough.  “So far, so good,” he said to himself with a laugh that edged on hysteria, and then bit his tongue and made himself shut up.

He waited for a good while, dozing on and off, until it seemed like the commotion had died down and the men had either spread out far enough or given him up for lost, and then he carefully edged out of his little hidey-hole.  There was one man left guarding the entrance to the bandits’ cave, but he was focused out on the middle distance.  It was easy to just keep sliding along the cliff face until he had enough ground between them that he probably wouldn’t look like much more than another dusty-brown blur in the rocky landscape, if he was noticed at all.  He hunched down there and tried to think.

The town, far as it was, was probably his best bet.  Chisolm, at least, had some sense, and would probably be on the lookout for information or messages, and maybe leave some for him in return.  And if Horne was having a good day, he’d know which direction Faraday would go.  Yes, town was the best he’d get.  It was also the only landmark worth mentioning.

All he had to do to get there was cross several miles of level, uncovered terrain in the middle of the night, while a small army of pissed-off bandits hunted for him.  He felt a sudden, fierce regret that Red Harvest wasn’t here with him, or maybe just here instead of him.  The man could disappear on a wide-open plain at high noon, and that was sheer skill rather than a gift.  Faraday knew a lot of magic tricks, but that was not one of them.

“It’ll be easy,” he said to himself quietly.  “Yeah, easy.”  Even to himself, he didn’t sound very convincing.

Still, there was nothing to do but try.  He went low and slow for a good while, trying not to make himself too obvious a target for anyone looking for something out of place, but that just made his leg ache.  “It was more suspicious, anyway,” he muttered, straightening up, unable to help the quick, compulsive glance around him.  He was still in the clear.

After that, he just walked.  He took care to look as relaxed and calm as he could, like any kind of man who happened to go wandering through the desert at night.  He’d be able to see anyone coming from a fair distance off, just like they’d be able to see him, and he could deal with that if and when it came up.

At one point, he saw a couple figures not too far off, and clearly they saw him in return, but he held his ground, put his hand to the stolen gun on his belt, and after a moment or two they moved on.  Other than that, his way was clear all the way into town.

The big sign on the main street said Desert Edge, and Faraday was so happy to see English that he almost didn’t spare a thought for the fact that the town name really didn’t suit it.  There was no edge to the desert in sight, just a dusty plain that went on and on.  Still, a town was a town, and the English meant he hadn’t somehow been dragged across the border to Mexico.

It was almost dawn.  The sky was lightening eastward, but it was still plenty dark out, so he wasn’t all that surprised to find everything and everyone still asleep.  Even the white-haired man on the porch outside the jail was snoring, his deputy badge and shotgun glinting in the light of the dirty oil lamp hanging from the rafters.

“Small town charm,” Faraday said to himself, shaking his head in disbelief.  He went up to the man, making sure to wait politely off to the side and at a good distance, raised his hands open-palm, and coughed gently.

The deputy snorted himself awake, almost choking on his own mustache in his surprise.  He fumbled the shotgun, nearly dropping it.  Faraday only barely resisted the urge to roll his eyes.  Eventually the man had himself together enough to point his weapon toward Faraday, only to find Faraday’s hands already held skyward and waiting.  “Morning,” Faraday said, as calmly as if this was a typical greeting and not him on the wrong end of a barrel.

“Er, good morning,” the deputy said, wavering for a moment before slowly lowering the gun.  Faraday lowered his hands, too, but kept them away from his stolen weapons.  “Can I—uh—can I help you, son?”

“Well, certainly,” Faraday said brightly, skirting the edge of sarcasm as much as he was able.  “I’ve just had a difference of opinion with those bandits you’ve got up in a cave about three miles off, and I was hoping someone might be willing to offer me a hand.”

The deputy frowned, and then swore.  “They’re back already, are they?” he said.  “Those damned Mexican thieves.  That’s the third time this year we’ve had to run them off.”

“Right,” Faraday said.  He didn’t particularly care, and didn’t try very hard to sound like he did.  “Look, is there any chance I could get some water?”

The deputy was only too happy to comply.  He waved a hand, and the water bucket and ladle on the porch steps rattled.  He frowned, his eyes tightening, and then the whole thing slid forward, scraping against the boards until it came to a neat stop by Faraday’s boot.  Faraday drank until his mouth tasted less like sand, more interested in that than in making small talk about how it was the deputy could make a thing move without touching it.  It was a hell of a gift, though, make no mistake.

“What happened to you?” the deputy asked, but he had waited until Faraday was done, which made Faraday feel much more kindly toward him.

“I was with a group, but I seem to have been shanghaied,” he said, keeping it simple.  “I just need to get some information, maybe send a message and pick up some supplies, and then I’ll be on my way.”  He didn’t relish the thought of heading out into the desert, but at the very least he could try to win himself a horse and make his way back to where he’d last seen the others.

“With a group, huh?”  The deputy squinted at him, trying to see under the shadow of his hat in a way that made his hackles rise.  “You got a name?”

Faraday settled back on his heels and tried not to scowl.  “Why?  You looking for someone?”

Lucky for him, the deputy seemed more interested in gossip than in Faraday’s paranoia.  “This lawman rolled into town yesterday with a couple of mean-looking sons-of-bitches.  Had a bunch of strange powers, too,” the deputy told him eagerly.  It seemed that this was the most exciting thing that had happened here for a while, excepting the bandits.  “Said that one of his boys was missing, and that they were looking around the area.”

“You talking about Sam Chisolm?”

Faraday had to bite back a grin when the deputy immediately perked up.  “Yes, sir, that’s him!  You must be his missing man—uh, Mr. Far-day?  He’d have been out tearing up the countryside looking for you, if I hadn’t told him those bandits had been driven out months back, and nothing left around here but the snakes.”

“Right,” Faraday said, and figured the deputy couldn’t fault him for the disbelief in his voice.  “Well, I’m Faraday.  Any chance you can direct me to Chisolm?”

The deputy was only too eager to comply, and they went off down the street, the man chattering on about the town, the bandits, and the terrible trouble they’d been having the last few years.  Luckily, it didn’t take much thought to nod and agree at the right moments, keeping the conversation going.  A ways down, the single street took a harsh turn, and shopfronts gave way to boarding houses and small homes.  They turned too.

Faraday’s head was pounding, and his leg was aching something fierce, but he couldn’t help but smile when he heard a piercing whistle from high up.

“What in the hell—” the deputy said, more amazed than angry, but Faraday ignored him in favor of waving up at Billy Rocks, who had apparently taken the lookout up on one of the higher roofs.  Billy nodded back, tipped his head at one of the boardinghouses, the one that also advertised a restaurant and saloon, and then disappeared into the shadows.

“What was that?” the deputy said, drawing Faraday back to ground.  “Was that—why was that man running around on the rooftops?”

“Oh, that’s just Billy,” Faraday said, waving him off.  He started walking as quickly as he could toward the building Billy had indicated, which truly wasn’t all that fast.  His leg wasn’t quite working like it should.  “He’s a little odd, but he’s harmless.  Mostly.  He’ll let the others know I’m back.”  He snorted out a laugh—back, like he’d just gone for a day’s ride downriver.

The deputy had paused to stare, and had to break into a jog to catch back up.  After a good pause, he spoke up again.  “He said—Mr. Chisolm said—that there was an _Indian_ with them, too, and not to worry if he came riding into town.”

“That is true,” Faraday said.  A light had just turned on downstairs in his destination—Chisolm always had slept light, and no doubt he’d heard Billy’s whistle as well as Faraday coming up the street.

“But—really?” The man sounded impressed.  “An Indian?”

Chisolm was going to have to hog-tie Red Harvest to keep him from shooting the too-curious townsfolk around here, Faraday thought with a wry smile, but then the door to the boardinghouse flew open and he forgot the deputy entirely.

In the dim light from inside, he could make out Chisolm first, then Vasquez, as they came hurrying out onto the porch.  Billy and Goody hovered a little farther back, just inside the doorway, and Faraday grinned his best shit-eating grin.  “Did you miss me?” he called out.

“ _Hijo de puta_ ,” Vasquez snarled back at him, but then he smiled, taking some of the sting out of it.  His gift was a prickling wave of pissed-off relief as it rushed over him, familiar and safe.  “I’m going to kill you myself if you keep doing this.”

Faraday clapped a hand over his chest and put on his best innocent expression.  “But this time wasn’t my fault, I swear.”  He paused halfway up the porch steps, doing his best not to limp.  “Probably.”

Inside, Goody snorted out a laugh.  “That’s real convincing.”  He raised his eyebrows.  “And your heart’s on the other side.”

This time, even Billy laughed.  Faraday couldn’t muster up enough effort to be offended.

“Alright, enough standing around.  Get on inside.”  Chisolm ushered him up, watching him like a sparrowhawk, while Vasquez turned and said something quietly to the deputy that had him scuttling away like a mouse back to his hole.  Faraday smirked at him as he passed, and Vasquez grinned a coyote’s grin back and bumped his shoulder against Faraday’s, too lightly to throw him off balance.  His mind-touch sidled back up against Faraday, another little sly nudge, and it was enough to make him relax almost against his will.  There was something damn reassuring about knowing he didn’t have to watch his own back all the time.

Inside was cool and quiet, and Faraday could have cried with sheer relief.

“What the hell happened?” Chisolm said, yanking a chair out from under one of the dusty tables and shoving him down into it.  The place was deserted and only vaguely dirty, a ringing endorsement if there ever was one.  At least the chair was sturdy enough; he did his best to make it look more like sitting down than falling down, but wasn’t sure that he’d pulled it off.  At least they all had the decency to pretend not to notice.  Sam grabbed another chair and took a seat with him at the table, with Goody and Billy following just a step behind.  Vasquez, apparently still too jittery to relax, just wandered over to hold up the wall at Faraday’s side.  “We woke up yesterday morning and you were just—gone, and I didn’t hear a damn thing.  If my horse hadn’t been where you left it, we’d have thought you’d run off.  Red Harvest and Horne are still out trying to track you down, though Horne did point us in this direction before they headed out.”

“Jack is my horse,” Faraday said staunchly, like he did every time Chisolm brought it up.  “I paid my debt, fair and square.  And I have no clue how it happened, Sam.  I woke up in a cave full of bandits with nothing but the clothes on my back and a lump on my head.”

“Hit again, _guero_?” Vasquez said, rightfully exasperated.  “ _Sólo tienes una cabeza_.”  Faraday shrugged, ignoring what he didn’t understand in favor of the spirit of the thing.  To be truthful, he himself was a little annoyed.  He seemed to be having some trouble recently with getting knocked around the head, one way or another, and he wasn’t fond of the experience.

Billy nudged Goody, who leaned in over the table.  “Is that why you’re bleeding?”

“Aw, shit.  Still?”  Faraday sighed and took his hat off.  He checked his nose first—that seemed to be fine now, thankfully—and then the knot on the back of his head, before finally wiping the back of his hand against his temple.  Dried blood flaked away, along with a smear of fresh stuff.  He glanced down at his hat, and found a red-brown stain spreading under the brim.  “ _Shit_.  Not again.  I’m gonna have to clean my hat.”

Chisolm’s eyebrows had practically hit his hairline.  “Jesus Christ, Faraday,” he said, looking him over.  “I smelled the blood, but I didn’t think it was _you_.”

“Well, it’s not all mine,” Faraday pointed out, reasonably enough.  Whatever there was on his clothes and hands, well, that was probably from that second guard.

That didn’t seem to help.  There was a pause, where Faraday looked around but nobody would quite meet his eyes.  Goodnight had an elbow planted on the table and his head in his hand, Billy was frowning enough for the expression to actually show, and Vasquez just looked—and felt— faintly murderous, a little edge of that same sizzle-spit feeling he got before a fight drifting off him.  “What?” he said.  “ _What_?”

“Nothing,” Goody said after a speechless second, waving him off with his free hand.  “Never mind.  Right, so you woke up with a bunch of bandits, and then…?”

Faraday shrugged, letting it go, and then thought for a minute about how to phrase his adventures diplomatically.  “Well, I waited for most of them to go to sleep,” he said at last.  “Then I killed everyone between me and the exit and ran like hell.”

Vasquez burst into startled laughter.  Billy looked like he wanted to follow Goody’s example and put his head in his hands.

“Jesus _Christ_ , Faraday,” Chisolm said again.

“Well, what was I supposed to do, Sam?” Faraday asked, trying not to whine.  “Ask politely for my things and go about my day?  They knocked me over the head, tied me up, and tossed me in a cave!”  He crossed his arms over his chest.  “And I never did get my guns back,” he added, hitching up one of his stolen weapons between thumb and forefinger so they could see.  “I had to take these pieces of junk instead.  It’s just not right.”

Vasquez leaned forward, interest caught.  “Can I see that?” he said.  Faraday shrugged, spun it around, and handed it over grip-first.

“What I can’t figure out is why the hell they took you in the first place,” Chisolm said thoughtfully, watching Vasquez clear the chamber before turning the gun over and peering down the barrel.  “Far as I can tell, they didn’t take any of your things, or ours.  Didn’t disturb us at all, and that’s damn hard to do without some kind of gift to speed it along.”  It wasn’t bragging—Faraday was reasonably sure Chisolm could hear a man’s heartbeat from across town, if he tried.  “It’s an awful lot of effort for not a lot of gain, so all I can think is that all they wanted was _you_.”

“You, as in me, in particular?” Faraday said, skeptical. “I’ve pissed off a lot of people in my life, but I think I’d remember if there was a Mexican gang gunning for me.”

“Not a gang,” Vasquez said firmly, reloading the pistol with a few quick motions and setting it down in the center of the table.  He kicked out the chair next to Faraday, turned it around, and sat down straddling it before gesturing at the gun.  “This is Mexican Army issue.  Maybe ten years old.  Well-kept.”

“Huh.  Not the gun that a man would buy for himself,” Goody said.  He plucked it up off the table and eyed it, eventually holding it out so Billy could do the same.  When Chisolm turned an expectant eye on Faraday, he handed over the second pistol for Chisolm to inspect as well.  “He must have had them on hand already.  That what you’re saying?”

“ _Si_ ,” Vasquez said with a sharp nod.

“So the _Mexican Army_ tried to shanghai me?” Faraday said, slumping a little in his seat.

Chisolm was already waving him off.  “Ex-army, probably,” he said, handing one pistol back to Faraday, who tucked it back in his stolen belt.  Billy handed the other one over as well with a brisk nod.  “Militaries don’t issue ten-year-old pieces.”

“Oh, ex-army,” Faraday said, nodding along.  “Sure, that narrows it down.  Sam, I have never, at any point, pissed off anyone in the Mexican Army!”

“Alright, man, alright,” Chisolm said, waving his hands in the universal sign for _hold your horses_.  “Okay.  So it’s probably not the Mexican Army or the government; we know that.”  _Probably,_ Faraday mouthed, unimpressed.  “We know who they aren’t.  We don’t know who they actually _are_.”

“Now, wait a minute.  The real important question is still _why_ ,” Goody said, pulling at his lapels.  “Did they want Faraday or some look-alike?  If that’s the case, they may well try again.  Or were they looking to take anyone, and he was the first they saw?”  He thought for a moment, and then leaned back in his chair.  “They didn’t want him dead, else they’d have killed him where they found him.  So what did they want with him?”

There was a long pause where they all considered that.  “Nothing good,” Vasquez said finally.

The gaping blank spot in his memories between going to sleep and waking up captured was starting to look more and more threatening.  “Sweet Lord,” Faraday said, manfully resisting the urge to put his head down on the table.  “This gets better and better.”  Vasquez’s mind prodded at his, wordless reassurance, and Faraday told himself firmly that it didn’t make him feel better, excepting all the ways that it kind of did.

Light began to creep through the windows.

“Go on, Faraday,” Chisolm said, apparently taking pity on him.  “Go and get cleaned up.  We’ve got all the rooms upstairs, so you can find an empty bed and get some sleep.  We’ll deal with all this tomorrow.  Horne and Red Harvest are meant to check in just after noon, providing they don’t find anything worth finding, and we can come up with a plan then.”

“Providing _they_ don’t wake up in a cave,” Faraday grumbled, but pushed himself upright anyway, and tried not to hiss too obviously between his teeth when his bad leg screamed in protest.  They all pretended politely not to notice, even Vasquez, who kicked out a foot like it was an accident and left his leg braced across Faraday’s shins while he wobbled.  A little of the pain drifted out of him, Vasquez’s gift lending a hand just until he found his footing.

Faraday kept his knees locked, kept himself upright, and got moving toward the stairs—just like walking drunk, really, except when he drank enough it was hard to feel much of any pain at all.  “Besides, I’ve already got all the plans I need,” he called back over his shoulder.

“What’s that?” Chisolm said.

“I’m gonna find the son-of-a-bitch who took my guns, take them back, and then shoot him a bunch of times in the face.”

They took that in for a bit.

“That seems a bit of a recurring theme with you,” Goody said.  “A common drift, if you catch my meaning.  Surely there are methods besides shooting what ails you until it goes away?”

Billy spoke up, slow and thoughtful.  “I still like it,” he said.  “It’s simple.  Easy to remember.”

Chisolm sighed.  “It’s everything else that worries me,” he said, and then the four of them got back to the business of discussing things like strategies and motivations, and Faraday decided that was enough of that.

He dragged himself up the stairs, let himself drop on the first unused bed he saw without even bothering to take off his boots, and was out like a light.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Translations (I'm assuming we've all got yes/no/guero down by now):  
> Hijo de puta - son of a bitch  
> Sólo tienes una cabeza - you only have one head


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So it seems like I've basically decided to just dump out a chapter every time I've written/edited enough to find a decent stopping place. Pacing might be kind of weird, but at least it's getting out. Right??? Anyway, enjoy.

Waking up sent Faraday into a bit of a panic, before he realized that the blood everywhere mostly wasn’t his, and that maybe he ought to have taken Chisolm’s advice and cleaned himself up before dropping off.  In the afternoon sunlight, the red-brown smears on the bed linens made it look like someone had died there overnight.

“Sweet Jesus,” Faraday said, awed, as he took it in.  Looking down at himself didn’t present a much prettier picture.  There was blood there, too, ground into the creases on his hands and dried in stiff patches down his clothes, almost invisible against the dark fabric.  “That—that is just not right.”

How was it that Billy, who killed more men with knives than anyone he’d ever known, never seemed like quite so much a mess after?  Maybe it was a part of his gift.

There was a washbasin against the wall, a pitcher of water standing alongside, and after stumbling over to it, Faraday did his best to clean off while the water slowly turned a rusty brown.  His clothes, sadly, were probably a lost cause.  Luckily, someone had brought up his saddlebags while he’d slept, and he managed to make himself look mostly presentable with the spares he had tucked inside.

When he stripped off his vest, a small cloth sack went tumbling to the floor.  Momentarily at a loss, he stared at it until the memory returned: the parcel of messages he had stripped off the first dead guard.  With enough good light, he could finally open it up and take a look.  The sheaf of folded papers inside didn’t make much sense, all full of cryptic drawings and meaningless scribbles—none of it was in English.  Unsurprised, he tucked it back into his clean vest.

Cracking open the door to his small, one-bed room let in some noise.  With hat in hand and stolen gun belt slung around his waist, he ventured out.

In the light of day, the bar seemed mildly more reputable than it had in the darkness before dawn.  The place was wide and open, with a narrow balcony letting the rooms for rent overlook the rafters and the main room downstairs, where mirrored glass on the walls had clearly been scrubbed down sometime in the last few years.  The collection of locals with their drinks and cards were less filthy than some and in possession of more of their limbs than most.  The glasses on the bar top were clean.  Best of all, the atmosphere was relaxed and friendly, with only a few interested glances passing over him before settling back on their own business.

All in all, it was a decent spot for a good game, or so Faraday thought with some eagerness, patting down his pockets before he remembered that his deck of cards was missing.

Damn it all.  He’d have to find a new one, though it’d be a while before it really felt like _his_ again.

Business first, though; that would have to wait.  Even as he scoped out a few likely tables, he caught sight of Chisolm tucked away in a back corner with his back to the wall.  When he moved closer, the rest of the table came into view: Billy facing out, keeping an eye on the room, and Goody facing Chisolm, gesturing as he said something.  Vasquez was nowhere to be seen, and Red Harvest and Horne were still missing.

“Afternoon,” he called out, and waved.

Chisolm saw him first, then Billy; Goody twisted around a moment later to look for himself, only to pause and draw himself up short.  “ _Hoo_ , boy,” he said with a soft whistle, staring hard at Faraday.  “Isn’t that a pretty picture?”

Faraday reached the table and slid into a seat, twisting so his back was to the wall, and glanced from one man to the next.  “What’s that?”

Billy snorted.  “Your _eye_ ,” he said.

At the same time, Chisolm frowned over at him.  “Have you looked in a mirror yet?” he asked, waving a hand at his face.

“Mirror?  Eye?  No,” Faraday said, turning even as he said it to glance at the silvered glass lining the wall behind him.

The black eye was impossible to miss and colored like a sunset—all purples, blues, and blacks.  Faraday was probably damn lucky his nose hadn’t broken after all when Scar the bandit had kicked him in the face; as it was, he was mostly surprised he couldn’t feel the thing in the slightest.

It did look damn unpleasant, though, so he saw their point.  “Ah,” he said, barely resisting the urge to poke at it.  “ _That_ eye.”  He gave up and prodded it lightly, wincing at the sudden ache.

Goody muttered something about a _goddamn child_.  Billy kicked him under the table and then pretended he hadn’t.

Chisolm sighed.  “Well, Faraday,” he said, deciding to take the high ground.  He shoved a couple plates in Faraday’s direction.  “You eat yet?”

Faraday was suddenly hungrier than he’d been his entire life.

“Jack and Red Harvest are due back any minute,” Chisolm told him while he grabbed a fork and started stuffing food into his mouth like a man starved.  “Hopefully, they’ve got something we can use, though I reckon we’ll figure something out regardless.  We’ll gather up what we can once we know.”

Faraday paused in his chewing long enough to speak.  “Where’s Vasquez?”

Chisolm looked at Goody; Goody looked at Billy, who shrugged.  “Lying low,” Billy said, like that was any kind of explanation.

With a cave full of Mexican bandits up in the hills, maybe it was.

“Well,” Faraday said, laying down his fork long enough to fish out his stolen parcel and toss it onto the table with a flourish.  “Anyone else here read Mexican?”

Chisolm’s gaze went sharp.  “What’s this?”

Faraday shrugged.  “I forgot all about it earlier,” he said.  “Took it off one of the bandits on my way out.  It caused a lot of excitement early on.”

“You _forgot_ ,” Billy said, completely expressionless.  The others mostly seemed resigned.

Faraday waved him off.  “I know, I know,” he said, unashamed.  “It was a long day.”

Ignoring that, Goody shook the papers out and spread them across the table, immediately focused, while Chisolm poked skeptically at the sack they’d come in.  “There’s blood on this thing.  A _lot_ of blood.  I can still smell it.”

Faraday shrugged again, and then nodded agreeably.  Both guards had bled quite a bit.  “Probably.  Good thing it’s oilcloth, or there’d be blood on the papers, too.  Now, don’t give me that look, Sam.”

Chisolm quickly shifted his expression. 

“I can’t make out a thing,” Goody said, turning the conversation around.  “Sam, you speak any Spanish?”

“Not well enough for this,” he said, glancing down and shuffling quickly through some of the pages.  “Vasquez’ll have to make it out.”  He folded the papers back up and shoved them back into the sack, flicking a nail against a blood spot with a shake of his head.

“I’ll take it up to the roof,” Billy said, which was how Faraday figured out that _lying low_ was apparently a new code for keeping watch on the street.  Billy put out his hand, and when Chisolm passed the parcel over, tucked it away out of sight.  His chair slid back with a screech when he stood.

Goody made to stand himself, but Billy shook his head, and the other man stayed in place but went—strange.  There was an odd, silent exchange as Billy walked past him, and Faraday might not have noticed Billy’s hand on Goody’s shoulder if it weren’t for the way Goody tensed up further and then relaxed, all at once.  He settled back into his seat like he’d meant to do it all along.

Faraday and Chisolm exchanged a quick look, but kept their mouths shut.  Goodnight Robicheaux might have been more willing to make his shots in the wake of their big showdown with Bart Bogue, steadier than ever when he had a clear purpose and direction set out in front of him, but he was jumpy as a startled rabbit other times for no real reason Faraday could discern.  Half the time, he and Billy only tolerated Faraday so well, in Faraday’s own opinion, because that prodding back-and-forth they’d developed was familiar enough to be one of those few steadying things.  Other times weren’t so great.  They’d all begun to learn the warning signs, though nobody’d say a damn thing about it to Goody’s face or try to interfere in whatever system Billy had developed for dealing with it.  At one time or another, they’d all caught Goody staring off into the middle distance, or maybe at Billy’s neck, at the raised white line of a scar where a shot from the Gatling gun had raked across it.  When he started to look like he thought it was still bleeding, they all knew to nudge Billy in his direction, provided that Billy wasn’t making his way over already.

Billy, quiet as he was, knew all the right things to say.  Billy knew when to tug his neckerchief up to hide the scar and when to leave it be, a visible reminder that he was still there—that he was damn hard to kill, as a matter of fact.  They all were, of course, but none of them quite like Billy.

Billy disappeared up the stairs, letters in tow, and Goody watched him go.

Chisolm gave Faraday a speaking glance.

Never let it be said that Faraday didn’t know how to take a hint.  Besides, there were better things to do than listen in on whatever Chisolm wanted to say without prying ears.  “If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen,” he said, “I’ve got an appointment for a game and a drink or two.”  He reached for his cards, forgetting for an instant that they weren’t there—except they were, a surprise even to himself as he pulled them out of his pocket.  Hiding that instant of shock, he shuffled, bridged, and cut the deck with a showman’s flourish, and then made it vanish again between his open palms, back to his pockets this time rather than wherever it’d been a moment before.

He hurried away from the table, and tried not to think on it.

* * *

He settled in quick enough at a table, bought some locals a round or two, and was soon running a comfortable game.  Nobody seemed to have the coin or the inclination for high stakes, but it was amusing enough to try to win and lose in a steady back and forth, keeping himself in a way to break exactly even at the end of the game.  Bluffing was the best kind of magic trick, in Faraday’s opinion; a few words, a smile, and a tick in the jaw, and any man would be willing to bet as high or as low as he could want.

After a bit, Vasquez sauntered downstairs, Billy nowhere in sight—probably taking up his post out on the roofs, though Faraday couldn’t guess what they were hoping to spot.  His entrance got quite a bit more interest than Faraday’s had, and a fair bit of wariness as well, but he made his way to Chisolm and Goody’s table with a casual lack of concern that seemed to put the bar back at ease.  He caught Faraday looking as he went by, smiled, and tipped a wink with the eye that matched Faraday’s bruising.  His mind-touch felt like a clap on the shoulder, and then it passed.

Faraday grinned, and drew the attention of the bar off the others and back to himself by loudly starting to teach his tablemates to play lowball poker.

He’d gained a decent following by the time anything of interest happened, seven players with him around the table and another half-dozen or so watching closely, that familiar static-shock building in his hands and his cards as his powers hummed pleasantly along.  “Now, that’s not too bad a hand,” he was telling the man next to him when the commotion started.  “It’s called a smooth eight, see, ‘cause it’s eight-high, and then you’ve got all your other cards low, right?  Four-three-two-Ace—”

Outside, someone started to shout.

All around the room, men started to lean around, trying to figure out what was happening.  Faraday looked to Chisolm instead, saw that the man’s face looked like a thundercloud, and put his cards down on the table.  “Excuse me, boys,” he said, though nobody was paying him much attention.  “I’ll be back.”

Goody and Chisolm were already headed for the source of the commotion, Vasquez a casual step behind.  “Damn it all,” Chisolm ground out when Faraday caught up to them just inside the door.  “I _told_ the sheriff they were coming.”

“I’m not so sure he passed the news along,” Goody said, wryly amused.

Out in the street, Red Harvest had frozen halfway off his horse, poised with one foot still in the stirrups like he was considering leaping back on and riding like hell straight back out of town.  His tension was obvious in the little electrical sparks dancing along his arms, caught between his clenched fingers and drawn down the line of his spine.  Horne, already on foot, had put himself between Red and the rest of the street, and was saying something soothing in his soft voice.  Beyond him, a small crowd of fifteen or so had gathered, and at least four men that Faraday could see had already put hand to weapons.

Red Harvest saw the four of them coming, looked them each square in the eyes, and spat out something in Comanche that made even level-headed Chisolm wince.

“A dollar says Red shocks someone in the next ten minutes,” Faraday said quietly, leaning over so only Vasquez could hear.  Chisolm, who’d heard anyway, shot him a narrow-eyed look over his shoulder.

Vasquez laughed and shook his head, eyeing the scene while he settled himself against the porch rails.  “No bet.”

Chisolm moved down the steps like the wrath of God, frowning heavily as the eyes of the crowd turned his way.  Horne shifted sideways to accommodate him.  “What’s going on here, gentlemen?” he said, though surely he’d heard plenty already.

There was an outburst from the crowd, too confused to make out, and Chisolm just waved a hand to make it stop.  _There_ was a magic trick Faraday would love to learn.  “Jack?” he said to Horne after cutting a glance toward Red Harvest, who didn’t look inclined to explanations.  His light show was spreading, and he was throwing off little crackles of lightning that would have spooked any other horse but his own.

Horne frowned, a mild expression, and lifted his right hand to press against his chest.

It caught more attention than seemed right, until one recalled that his hand had never healed quite right from the arrow that had gone through it.  He still had some motion in his fingers, and he could still grip an axe or a gun, but there was a curious stiffness to it now, something anybody could see just by looking at it.  His middle and ring fingers had curled inward with the healing, despite Doc’s gift and best effort, until it was impossible for him to hold them straight; he could bend them toward his palm just fine, but could only stretch them out so far back before they locked in place.  The ugly hole in the center of his hand had healed shut well enough, but it had left behind a squashed oval-shaped scar, bumpy and large.

None of it seemed to hold him back any; Horne was just as fast and just as deadly as he’d ever been, though he still lacked the rattlesnake meanness to justify just how brutal he could be when killing.  His soft expression and softer voice didn’t do much to intimidate, and now he’d taken to holding his damaged hand against his chest before a standoff, showing off that visible weakness like he wanted folks to think he wouldn’t be much use in a confrontation.  When it came to a man with his skill and his gift for seeing the future, even in the immediate moment of a fight, a mistake like that was deadly.

It made Faraday laugh every time to see it work, because Jack Horne was still a bear, even with an injured paw; his teeth and claws were just as sharp as ever.

“These men,” Horne said, impossibly mild, “don’t much like our presence in their town.”

Goody sighed, shaking his head in mock disappointment.  “Is that so?”

There was another outbreak of noise, which Chisolm again waved off.  “One at a time, now.”

“Now, that’s not fair,” a dark-haired man near the back called up.  “We don’t have a problem with you, Mr. Chisolm.  We know your reputation, and you’ve been decent enough visitors in town.”

Chisolm raised an eyebrow.  “So you only have concerns about my man, then,” he said, rocking back on his heels.  Red Harvest was statue-still behind him, except for the slow rolling boil of his gift.  “Like I don’t know his measure ten times over.”

“We don’t need his kind here!” another man said, gathering the courage to speak.  Faraday resisted the urge to point out that Red Harvest understood English just fine.

“His kind?” Chisolm said, flat enough that Faraday was glad it wasn’t being directed at him.  The menace in it was unmistakable.  “I’m not sure I like your meaning, mister.”

The men muttered restlessly among themselves.

“Is this how you treat your guests?” Horne said gently, so gently, and so reasonable that even Faraday leaned into the sound.  “Lord knows we should show kindness even unto our enemies, and we are not enemies.  Why should we be cruel to our friends?”

“And we _are_ friends, aren’t we?” Goody said.  “Good friends.”  Somehow, in his casual drawl, the words still came out an effortless threat.  He sauntered over into place at Chisolm’s side, deceptively easy, and Faraday heard at least a few voices whispering his name, saw some folks shift uneasily in place.

“Of course we are, Mr. Robicheaux,” one said eventually, the others mumbling agreement behind him.

Red Harvest shook himself all over, his power dying down, and finally seemed comfortable enough to let his feet touch the ground.  Before anyone could do more than glance at him, he slid up the steps toward the bar, planting himself between Vasquez and Faraday.

Faraday offered him a friendly nod, which he returned.  Vasquez looked over the crowd, scowled, and moved a hand toward his hip.  There was a faint sizzle of menace coming off him, as if the threat alone wasn’t plenty.

Nobody seemed pleased, but they also didn’t seem much inclined to protest after that.

“Well, friends,” Chisolm said, with enough sarcasm to knock a man back on his heels.  “I think we should all go back about our own business.  Don’t you?”

That was their cue to loom, as much as six men could against over a dozen, and they went about it admirably well while the crowd started to disperse.  Faraday just smiled wide and friendly, thinking about whiskey and dice, long odds and quick shots.  Too bad Billy was up high, probably watching even now—something about those damn knives tended to make folks change their minds about starting something.

“Inside?” Goody said quietly.

Chisolm nodded.  “Get Billy to join us downstairs,” he said, and ran a hand over his face as he looked from Red Harvest to Vasquez to Faraday.  “We need to talk, and it might be best to get these folks used to seeing us around.”

* * *

The table Chisolm had claimed in the back corner of the bar was farthest from any doors but wasn’t meant to seat seven men.  They surrounded it anyway, letting Red Harvest settle in with his back to the walls so that he could keep an eye on the locals—but also so _they_ could see _him_ , hopefully decide he was harmless, and move on.  The others pressed in where they could, shuffling chairs and twisting in their seats but still knocking knees and elbows together with every shift.

Faraday, who didn’t mind trading a clear line-of-sight with the reflections in the mirrored glass lining the walls, settled in with his back to the bar, with Vasquez dropping into the chair to his left and Goody squeezing in at his right.  Horne patted him on the shoulder.  “Welcome back,” he said solemnly as he pressed past to sit in the chair next to Red Harvest, not bothering to ask before leaving the one beside Goody for Billy.  “I see you’ve had an adventure, though I had a feeling you would come out intact.  Mostly.”  He tapped a finger under his eye, and offered a watery smile.  “It’s good to see you safe, though not a surprise for a man of your gifts.”

Faraday resisted the urge to stiffen in his seat, though he eyed Horne carefully.  As far as he knew, only Red Harvest had any idea he might be gifted, though the method of the power probably still escaped him.  Horne, though—who knew what sorts of things Horne knew, or saw.

Red Harvest snorted, covering Faraday’s momentary lapse.  “Adventure,” he repeated, looking sidelong at Horne with a tiny shake of his head, but he nodded at Faraday again a moment later.  He had promised, Faraday remembered, to keep the secret.

“It was like taking a walking vacation in the countryside,” Faraday said high-handedly, recovering.  “I got to take in the desert views.  Scenic.  Lovely.”

Chisolm shot him a look from his seat between Red Harvest and Vasquez, and Faraday sobered and offered up a more detailed version of the events as he remembered them.

Horne looked thoughtful, pursing his lips.  Red Harvest leaned in a little.  “We tracked them into the desert.  Five or six men, on horse.”

“Faraday walked with them a fair ways, but there was a scuffle halfway between our camp and the stream,” Horne put in.  “As far as we could guess, they knocked you out and then dragged you a fair way before getting to the horses.”

Faraday cupped his chin in his palm and tried to think, but there was still no memory there: just a blank space between going to sleep and waking up the next evening.  He remembered the stream, a good distance off from the campsite; he didn’t remember moving away from camp or why he’d done it.

“I didn’t hear a thing,” Chisolm said thoughtfully.  “Vasquez didn’t feel anything off, and Horne didn’t see it coming.  That sounds like at least one gift to me.”

“No, two,” Billy said, frowning and shaking his head.  When everyone looked over at him, he shrugged.

Goody took over, grinning that sly little grin.  “Faraday went peacefully at least partway,” he pointed out.  “When have you ever known our Joshua to go kindly along with anything he didn’t feel like doing, even if the ruckus didn’t catch anyone’s attention?”

That did make more sense than anything else, Faraday had to admit.

“We followed the horses from there,” Red Harvest said, “but…”  He paused, and then rattled something off in Comanche.

“But sand and desert land, they don’t hold tracks for long,” Chisolm translated, and sighed.  “So we’ve got at least two powerful gifts, a gang of bandits up in the hills, and not a lot to show for it.”  He paused.  “Well, it could have turned out worse.”

They took that in.

“Right,” Faraday said briskly, and tried not to think too hard about the idea that an extra boot knife was the only reason he wasn’t still tied up in a cave, without even a chance of a rescue.  He turned to Vasquez instead.  “What about the letters?  Anything useful?”

Vasquez was already shaking his head.  “Nonsense, mostly,” he said, his elbow knocking against Faraday's as he sifted through the pages.  “Much was probably code.  The drawings—”  Here he paused, and pulled out a couple papers, marked with strange, labelled shapes, or grids and boxes.  “Maps and camps, I think, but no details.  _Es inútil_ , except for this.”  He tapped two fingers on a sheet lined with grids, filled with neatly labelled boxes.  “This is the layout of a camp to be set up some ways out, farther up in the hills.”  He pointed out one section of boxes.  “This is for the men.”  He shifted, and prodded at another large box off to the side.  “And this is for the horses.   _Guero,_ you saw thirty men, _sí_?”

Faraday shrugged.  He hadn’t exactly bothered to count them.  “More or less.”

Goody didn’t look pleased.  “Sam,” he said, looking down at the paper Vasquez had indicated.

“I know,” Chisolm said heavily.  “That camp’s not meant for thirty men.  I’d say at least three times that.  Probably more.”

They all stared down at the papers, and Faraday was pretty sure he wasn’t the only one with a sudden sinking feeling in his gut.

After a minute, Horne leaned in.  “What about these sections?”  He pointed out the remaining sections on the map, far smaller but not insignificant.  “What’s this say?”

“ _Trabajo_ ,” Vasquez said, shrugging.  “Work, labor.”

“So now they’re doing something out there?”  Faraday did not like the sound of that.  “What kind of labor?”

And then it was Billy’s turn to say the depressingly obvious.  “Nothing good.”

They all went silent.  Behind them, the bar was full of noise and movement, but their corner was quiet and still.  The whole thing was a disaster of confusion, wrapped in a bit of threat—there were too many pieces missing to see the full picture, but the few they had fell in ugly shapes.

And, more importantly, _interesting_ ones.

Faraday wasn’t the only one to look up at Chisolm.  One at a time, they all shifted to look his way, and a spark of something passed between them—literally, in Vasquez’s case—a thrill, a rush of something like excitement.  They’d been lying low, keeping quiet, for all these months since Rose Creek, but it seemed like all of them had missed having a bit of action to keep things lively.

“You know,” Chisolm said slowly, looking from one face to the next, “we really ought to take a look into this.”

Goody glanced at Billy, just a flicker of his eyes.  “Just to be on the safe side,” he said in cautious agreement.

Horne was already nodding, slow and solemn.  “It’s the right thing to do.  This town isn’t safe so close to men like these.”

Red Harvest nodded; Vasquez grinned, about ready to jump out of his seat already.

“I told you, I’ve already got my plan,” Faraday said, when Chisolm glanced his way.  “Get my guns, and shoot some bastards.  This falls in line.”

Chisolm looked like he didn’t quite believe he was saying it even as he said it.  “We’re doing this, then.”  He put both hands on the table, dark eyes intense; when he smiled, it was a surprise, a bright slash of white teeth.  “Alright, boys.  Let’s see what we’ve got.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This ended up being longer than I expected?? But hey, I finished it. Also, it is incredibly difficult to write insults for characters from the late 1800s without actually using the incredibly incredibly horrible racist terminology of the time. I did my best to find something that hit "would actually offend these people in this context" without actually getting to "holy shit I can't believe I just thought that word let alone considered writing it down" but if anything is actively terrible, please let me know and I will fix it.

The plan went something like this: a lot of hurry up and wait.

Goody was best suited to scouting around town, talking to locals and asking some questions without making folks uncomfortable.  His name was known even in these parts, and when he tried, he could make himself seem more harmless than any of them.  Something about his posture, Faraday assumed, since for a man who’d killed as much and as well as the so-called Angel of Death, he had an impressive habit of disappearing into the woodwork when he didn’t want to be seen.  Billy had decided to go along, which Faraday felt might defeat the purpose somewhat.  He was unusual enough to catch attention, and always carrying those damn knives—it didn’t exactly scream _trustworthy friend_.  But when Chisolm had first suggested the idea to Goody, Billy hadn’t asked permission; he’d simply assumed he was going along, and nobody had the will to question it.

Red Harvest volunteered, apparently, to go back out and scout around off by the cave and up in the hills.  He wasn’t particularly interested in staying in town, not with the climate being what it was.  At least he accepted Chisolm’s request to wait for Faraday to give him a closer report on the cave and the bandits, but he didn’t want to stick around for anything else, not even a meal or a bed.  When Chisolm asked him to pause at least for a bite, he muttered something that sounded an awful lot like “food for dogs” before shaking his head.

Horne took up the offer of a bed, and then offered to join Goody in befriending the locals later on.  “You have your people, and I have mine,” he said, whatever that meant—Faraday had a sudden flash of a roomful of bearlike hunter-preachers, nodding solemnly as Horne showed them the brutally sharp edge of his favorite axe.

Vasquez had the papers, whatever there was left to find there; Chisolm wanted him to take a closer look, see if there was any little thing worth noting.  Faraday, meanwhile, got a hard look and a pointed suggestion to rest.  He considered arguing—he wanted his guns back, damn it—but Chisolm had that mule-stubborn look on his face, the one he got when he started loudly considering repossessing Faraday’s horse.  It was best to let those things go.

“What about you?” Faraday asked, a bit put-out about being told to stay out of the way.  He remembered suddenly that he would be doing said waiting in a bar, and perked back up; the promise of whiskey always did a wonder for his mood.  Besides, he could always do a little more information gathering of his own. 

It was always good to know the state of folks’ wallets.

“I’ll be having a talk with the law around here,” Chisolm said, with an expression that said they might not enjoy the conversation all that much.  “It seems they left some things out when I came around asking earlier.”

The main door flew open, and conversation around the room quieted briefly as a short, thin man with a bristly mustache came in.  Even in the dingy mirror, Faraday could make out the shine of a badge on his chest.  “Ah, Mr. Chisolm!” he said, spotting their group, and began to make his way over.

“Speak of the Devil,” Goody muttered.

“Sheriff Halleck,” Chisolm called out, nodding, and then lowered his voice to hiss at Goody, keeping his lips still.  “Don’t antagonize the man, Goodnight.”

“Afternoon, boys!” the sheriff called as he approached.  He wasn’t much to look at, not at all physically impressive, but he had a walk and a presence that suggested confidence.  Faraday still wasn’t greatly impressed.  The man hadn’t so much as glanced around the bar upon walking in, and he stopped directly behind Faraday’s chair, as if a jumpier man wouldn’t have seen it as an open threat.  As it was, Faraday just shifted his seat closer to Vasquez and watched him in the mirrors lining the walls.  “How are y’all doing?”

“Just fine, Mr. Halleck,” Goody drawled, leaning back in his chair.  The man seemed to have made an impression on Goody, and not a good one.  Goodnight Robicheaux could be a hard man to rile, but it was clear he was already spoiling for a fight.

“Good, good.  And this must be your missing man!”  The sheriff smiled brightly down at Faraday, pleased as if he’d been the one to drag Faraday back to safety himself.

“That’s right,” Chisolm said.  “Turns out he ran into some bandits out in the desert.  Those same ones that you, sheriff, assured me were long gone.”

Halleck looked surprised, but Faraday had spent the day watching for tells, and something about the expression felt off.  “Like I told you, Mr. Chisolm, we ran them off.  They’re like a bunch of damn cockroaches, though, and I’m ashamed to say I’m not altogether surprised they’re back.”  He was most likely embarrassed, Faraday decided; it had to be shameful that the local law couldn’t scare off a single band of thieves.  Glancing at Vasquez didn’t much help, though the man was also watching the sheriff with narrowed eyes—so he wasn’t the only one who felt something off.

“But as I said, your man made it back safely,” the sheriff said, completely unaware.  “All’s well that ends well?”  He patted Faraday once on the shoulder with a heavy hand.

“Oh, sure.  I do believe everyone should try it,” Faraday said, and tipped his head back so his sunset-black eye was fully visible.  “Best day off I’ve had in months.”

The sheriff stuttered, but quickly rallied, deciding to pretend that he didn’t understand the sarcasm.  “Glad to hear it, glad to hear.  Now, what’s this I hear about an incident earlier?  This is a peaceful town, boys,” Halleck said.  His gaze jumped from one face to the next, like he just couldn’t keep himself still.  “We don’t want trouble, but that doesn’t mean we just stand by when folks try and start something.”

“We didn’t come here to cause problems,” Chisolm said peaceably.  “You had fair warning who we were and that we’d be in town, so you can’t fairly blame us for the situation outside.”

The sheriff waved that off.  “Now, that’s not what I was trying to say, not at all,” he said.  “I’m not accusing anyone of anything.  I just came to give you fair warning of my own, especially given some of your—”  He paused, clearly floundering, and Faraday tapped a fingernail against the table while Halleck’s gaze jumped from Red Harvest, to Billy, to Vasquez, and then back to Chisolm.  “Uh, _exotic_ elements.”

“And what do you mean by that?” Goody asked, deceptively mild.

Billy’s hand, which was semi-casually resting along the back of Goody’s chair, tightened briefly around the fabric of Goody’s collar.  Across the table, there was the faintest smell of ozone, the only outward sign that Red Harvest wasn’t enjoying this line of conversation; Vasquez just looked like he’d been expecting it, which made it somehow worse.

“Now, I’m not trying to cause trouble, Mr. Robicheaux,” the sheriff said, raising his hands.  “I’m just saying, it’s been a bad few years, and folks don’t take kindly to those they can’t understand.”

Goody bared his teeth.  “What, they have a problem with _people_?” he said, leaning forward so that his collar slid free of Billy’s restraining grip.  “There’s not a damn thing different between any of these boys and your townsfolk, sheriff, excepting that me and mine care about what’s inside a man’s head instead of what color it is on the outside.”

That seemed to get the man right in the gut.  “Folks around here have a right to be cautious,” the sheriff said, getting heated.  “We’ve had trouble from just about every direction over the last five years—and now we’ve got these damn Mexicans trying to stir things up, no matter how many times we up and drive them out.  They’ve got the whole town on edge.  If you ask me, the whole country’s full of murderers and rapists and damn thieves.”

Vasquez jerked in his seat, the split second of his mind-touch practically seething with that all too familiar sizzle-spit fight-feeling, hot as a wildfire.  Before he could think better of it, Faraday kicked out a heel and pressed it hard against the other man’s shin, weathering Vasquez’s glare with a barely-visible head shake and a slow blink.

The sheriff caught the mind-touch and the movement, and remembered himself.  “Though I guess some must be good folks,” he said weakly.

“ _Sheriff Halleck_ ,” Chisolm said, low and sharp, and everyone around the table came to attention so fast it made Faraday’s head spin.  “I’m not sure I like what you’re implying, especially since we’ve paid our bills and kept out of trouble.  Now, you’ve managed to insult me and most all my boys, but we respect that you’re keeping up law and order in these parts, and we don’t intend to cause problems for you or yours.  All I ask is that you offer us that same respect, and let us go about our business in peace.”  He leaned forward in his seat, a lazy threat.  “Does that seem fair to you?”

There was a moment of strangeness; Faraday didn’t know how else to describe it.  Nobody moved, and nothing changed, but for a split second, Sheriff Halleck felt unimaginably small, like something seen from far off, distant and unimportant.  He was used to Chisolm cutting folks down to size, but it was never quite this literal.  And it wasn’t just him feeling it, clearly, since everyone around the table took a deep breath and relaxed all at once.  Even Faraday felt the urge to do the same, and he was sitting with his unprotected back to a man he’d known for all of two minutes.

The strangeness passed.  The tension rose again, but to nowhere near what it had been.  Faraday found himself questioning whether anything had happened at all.

His fingers twitched toward his cards, looking for that inch of reassurance.

“Surely,” Horne said, cutting the silence, and reminding them that cooler heads could prevail.  He looked at Halleck with a placid, peaceful expression.  “Surely, sheriff, you won’t tar us all with the same brush as those villains?  As the Bible tells us, _let us not therefore judge one another anymore: but judge this rather, that no man put a stumbling block or an occasion to fall in his brother’s way_.”  Halleck looked startled, and Horne added, “Romans, chapter fourteen.  A great verse.”

The sheriff shifted uncomfortably in place for a moment, but with Chisolm’s hard expression on one side and Horne’s easygoing calm on the other, it had to be hard to think about continuing his line of attack.  “Well, of course.  No offense meant, like I said.  No offense meant,” he said again, starting toward the door.  “Enjoy your stay in town, Mr. Chisolm.  Boys.”

He scuttled toward the door, not quite fast enough to be called running.  “One of these days, that man is going to mean no offense all the way into a shallow grave,” Goody said once he was out of earshot.

Faraday watched him go, pressing his fingertips to the table to keep grounded.  “Huh,” he said, thoughtful.  “Sam, is that man gifted?”

Chisolm shrugged, apparently unconcerned.  “Not so far as anybody knows,” he said.  “Not too many with powers in town at all, actually.  There’s a couple deputies, a farmer or two, and I believe the sheriff’s son.  Not the man himself.”

Faraday frowned, but finally shrugged it off.

Horne turned his gaze slowly around the table, eyes going distant.  “He’s walking on a grave,” he said.  “His, and ours.  Many others.  And no one’s.  He can’t hurt you.”

“Okay,” Goody said slowly, while they all processed that.  “That’s certainly a whole lot of nothing.”

Chisolm shook his head.  “Alright, we’ll worry about that if it comes to it,” he said, planting his hands on the table.  “No use borrowing trouble.”

* * *

They broke up their meeting, Billy and Goody headed for the door while Horne drifted toward the stairs.  The others lingered as Faraday offered up his best recollection of the situation up in the bandits’ little cave.

It wasn’t much.  Aside from the look of the place in particular, his little hidey-hole tucked away in the cliffs, and the meandering walk he’d taken back to town, there wasn’t much to say.  He repeated his count of the men, and mentioned the fire they kept going outside as something to look for.

“They don’t seem all too bright, frankly,” he said thoughtfully.  “Didn’t seem much concerned with keeping an eye on me, and they weren’t too organized with setting a watch.  It did make it easier for me when time came to, ah, slip away.”

Vasquez snorted out a laugh, and drew a finger across his throat when Red Harvest glanced his way and raised an eyebrow.  Faraday just shrugged expansively.  Chisolm looked like he was wondering why he’d invited any of them to stay on after Rose Creek.

Something occurred to him.  “Oh, and there’s one in particular with a scar up here,” Faraday added, running a finger over the spot on his own forehead.  “He’s got some kind of gift, hurts like hell when he touches you.”  He frowned, remembering.  “Bastard likes to kick a man when he’s down, too.  Maybe don’t get too close to that one.”

“He use that gift on you, _guero_?” Vasquez said, eyeing him up and down, like he was checking for more serious hurts that Faraday might be hiding.

“Eh, just the once,” Faraday said, leaning back in his chair until it was propped up on just two legs.  “I’m more upset about the kicking, to tell the truth.  The man damn near broke my nose, and I didn’t even get to shoot him for it.”

This didn’t seem to have the comforting effect Faraday had hoped it would.  Vasquez’s stare narrowed.  Chisolm rolled his eyes up toward the ceiling, long-suffering.  Red Harvest looked about as impassive as ever, except there was a needling air of disapproval to it.

Faraday rolled his eyes and waved them off.  “Really.  I’m _fine_.”

“You didn’t think to mention this sooner?” Chisolm asked, apparently done communing with the heavens.

Faraday furrowed his eyebrows, honestly surprised.  “Why?”

“Why, he says.”  Chisolm shook his head, exchanged a _look_ with Red Harvest and Vasquez that made Faraday want to bristle.  “Never mind.  Red, you get what you need?”

“Yes.”  He nodded once, sharp, and stood up from his seat, quickly gathering up his supplies.  He rattled off something in Comanche, Chisolm nodding along, and then eyed Vasquez and Faraday’s blank looks.  He sighed.  “I’ll return in two days.  Sunset.”  Without another word, he headed out the door.

“Well, goody,” Faraday said, pushing himself up from the table.  “Now, if we’re done with the judgmental portion of the afternoon, I’ll be going back to my cards.”

“That’s not—”  Chisolm sighed, then laughed.  “Alright.  Try not to traumatize these poor folks too badly, Faraday.  They’re not used to anyone quite like you in these parts.”

“What, handsome?” Faraday called back over his shoulder.

“Something like that.”

* * *

He didn’t go back to his game.  Instead he went out back, through the barroom door, through a little side room, and out into the alley beyond.  Just a little ways along, there were the stables.  He wandered casually along, minding his own business, until a loud snort and a snap of horse-teeth caught his attention.  He looked that way, and found Wild Jack glaring out at him, looking supremely pissed off.

It could be mighty difficult dealing with a horse smarter than he was, especially when that horse seemed to believe it owned _him_ rather than the other way around.

“Hey, Jack,” he said, holding both hands up in appeasement as he wandered over to the pen.  Unlike the others, which held maybe three or four animals each, Jack’s was entirely empty other than him, probably because nobody wanted to risk getting trampled every time they tried to saddle up their own mounts.  “How’ve you been?”

Jack bellowed at him, punctuating the sound with another snap of his teeth.  Faraday winced.

“I know, I know,” he said, putting on his best apologetic expression.  “You know it wasn’t intentional, Jack.  No need to be snippy.”  He finally got within touching distance, hands still held up, and paused a bit to let Jack consider that.

Jack, stubborn to the last, eyed his hand like he was considering biting it right off before he snorted again and settled.

“You behave for Sam and the boys?” he murmured, reaching out.  Jack graciously allowed him to rub a hand along the line of his neck.  “I hope you didn’t cause too much fuss.”

Jack’s shoulders _rolled_ , the closest thing to a shrug any horse could manage.  His eye fixed on Faraday with an intensity that suggested they both knew how stupid a question that was.  Slowly, he pulled back his lip, just enough to show the line of his teeth.

At least one someone’d been bit, that was for sure.

“Well, I wish you wouldn’t, but I suppose that’s fair,” he said, leaning back against the fencepost with his hand still lazily trailing up and down Jack’s neck.  “You wouldn’t be yourself otherwise.”

* * *

The next few days passed quietly.  It about killed Faraday to sit still through it all, as Billy, Goody, and Horne wandered around town and Red Harvest stayed out in the wilderness doing whatever it was he did.  Chisolm was in the process of ingratiating himself with the local lawmen, which meant Faraday saw a lot of him from across town, often with the well-mustached deputy who had so kindly directed Faraday to Chisolm and the others.  It figured that Chisolm would want to keep an eye on a man with a gift like his—it was a rarity to see anyone who could make things move with only a thought—but Faraday didn’t have a clue how Chisolm was getting him to go along with it.

Maybe he’d offered to introduce the man to Red, Faraday thought, and tried not to laugh.  He had been oddly google-eyed at the thought of a real-life Indian.

If he was slowly going out of his mind with boredom, at least Vasquez was stuck doing the same.  He’d gone through that packet of papers at least four more times that Faraday had seen, and probably more that he hadn’t, and hadn’t found anything more worth anything much.  The two of them spent most of their time in the bar downstairs from their rented rooms, Faraday claiming a table near the back corner while Vasquez planted himself at the front bar on the other side.  Between the two of them, they had the whole place covered if anything went awry.

When Red Harvest finally came riding back into town, it was something of a relief.

Chisolm heard him coming, and waited out in the street for him to show, just in case any of the more easily riled elements tried anything.  Though he still got a few sideways looks, nobody tried to run him off this time around; Chisolm’s thunderous expression probably pushed that decision along.

All of them present gathered up back at the table they’d mostly claimed for themselves.  Goody and Billy wandered in a few minutes later, having heard tell of Red’s arrival from wherever they’d been keeping themselves, and crammed into the last bit of available space.

Once they were all positioned, with the bare minimum of shoving and wriggling around the too-small table, Chisolm took out a blank sheet of crumpled paper and flapped a hand at Goody until the man provided him with the pencil stub he kept tucked in his front vest pocket.  “Red, you first,” he said.

“Fifteen or twenty out at the cave, not thirty,” Red Harvest said immediately.  “But tracks for many more left behind.  Lots of movement in and out during the day, but it all—”  He paused, thought.  “It stays near.  Nothing here or around the town itself.  I followed a few men high into the hills, where they have a settlement.  At least sixty there.”

Goody hummed thoughtfully, looking unhappy.  “Less than we thought, then, but still not good,” he said.  “At least it’s not quite over the border.”

“Two guards at night at the cave,” Red Harvest continued, mostly ignoring the interruption.  “None during the day, though many eyes watching out and moving.”  He rattled something off that only Chisolm had a hope of understanding.

“They’re sloppy,” Chisolm informed the rest of the table.  “If we want, we can probably take out the local ones, since they don’t seem to be expecting much trouble.”  He bit his lip.  “The ones up at the settlement might be more trouble, especially if we stir them up by clearing out their little cave.”

“Something is not right about this,” Red Harvest said, looking thoughtful.  Almost without seeming to realize it, he was rubbing his finger and thumb together, a lazy spark of light twitching and turning in the air just above.  “Thieves—steal.  They move.  These don’t.”

Horne picked up on his meaning.  “It does seem mighty strange that a band of evildoers such as these stay in their cave up in the hills, and leave the town be.”

Goody frowned.  “Still, that fits with what Billy and I picked up,” he said.  “Everyone in these parts, they’ve heard tell of the bandits, but it’s all just tales.  None of the townies have seen so much as hide or hair of this bunch of hoodlums.  Some of the folk from farther out from the town proper tell of some missing crops here, a few butchered animals there.  There’s a few other stolen bits and bobs, nothing too serious, and probably half invented.  The rest is just jaws flapping, as far as we can tell.  A number of homesteads miles and miles out being found empty of their residents and their most valuable property, and a number of travelers going missing but leaving behind everything but their boots.  It’s not a sensible way for a gang of bandits to operate, that’s for damn sure.”

“Seventy-five men don’t just hang around doing nothing for no reason, and thieves don’t take a man and leave behind his belongings,” Faraday pointed out, figuring that as the only one among them who’d met any of the fellows up close and personal, he was something of an expert in the situation.  He rocked back in his chair, patting Vasquez apologetically on the shoulder when the motion rammed the corner of the chair-back into the man’s arm.  Vasquez rolled his eyes, but didn’t bite his head off for it.  “It’s not like folks in town don’t have enough worth taking, if they’re after money and goods.”  He raised his eyebrows when everyone looked his way, surprised.  “You think I play for stakes and don’t learn the state of a man’s wallet?”

The looks went thoughtful.

“If that’s so, they want the men, and not their things,” Red Harvest said quietly.

Vasquez blanched.  Faraday wasn’t even looking at the man’s face, and he still felt the wave of realization that crashed over him, something horrified lurking underneath.  “The map, it said _trabajo_ ,” he said.  “Oh, _mierda_.  I thought they meant work— _ocupación_.  But maybe it was _trabajo forzado_.”

Faraday squinted at him.  “Which means?”

“Hard labor.  Forced labor.”

Billy hissed through his teeth like a scalded cat.

“I don’t like the idea,” Goody said slowly, and gave Billy a settling look when the man looked sharply over at him.  “I’m not so sure it’s entirely accurate, but I’m also not so blind that I’d suggest we reject it out of hand.  If that's the case, d'you think they’re working them there at the settlement?  Or shipping them over the border into Mexico proper?”

Billy was still bristling.  “Does it matter?”

They all silently acknowledged that it didn’t.

“Okay,” Faraday said slowly.  “Sam, I get the feeling we might be a _little_ out of our league.”

Of course, that had never stopped them before.

* * *

Unlike Bogue and the sense of impending doom that had descended over Rose Creek, there was no real need to rush this.  Chisolm and Goody wanted a look up at the cave, to figure out just how feasible it might be to clean it out, seven against twenty.  Red agreed to take the two of them out for a little look-see.

No one seemed all too concerned, truly.  They’d faced those odds before, and come through easily enough.

Horne went distant.  “We will wipe them from the face of the earth, like the great flood coming down from the heavens, and purge their wickedness from the land.”

“That’s great and all,” Faraday said, trying not to pout.  “But when do I get my guns back?”

Horne glowered at him.  Vasquez knocked their knees together, and what little Faraday caught of his mind-touch seemed caught between warm amusement and prickling wariness, all itching for a fight.

* * *

Still, all that truly meant was that Faraday had another few days at least to sit around and wait.  If something didn’t happen soon, he was going to do something he’d regret.

Or, well, Chisolm would regret it, probably.  Six of one, half a dozen of the other.

* * *

Luckily, something interesting occurred before any trouble had time to rise.

It was a decently quiet afternoon when the door slammed open, startling enough that activity in the bar stuttered to a stop.  Faraday, midway through a friendly round of blackjack at a table near the back, exchanged a quick look with Vasquez at the bar before letting his gaze settle on the newcomers.  There were quite a number of them—seven in all, a rowdy crowd, laughing and calling out to one another as they came strutting in.  They didn’t seem like much of a threat, and yet the locals had all gone stiff and averted their eyes, a few around the edges even gathering up their belongings and heading for the exits.

Even Faraday’s table-mates seemed put off.  “Who’s this bunch?” he asked casually, dropping his eyes down to his cards.  “They from around here?”

“That’s Sheriff Halleck’s son, Mr. Faraday,” said the man to his left—Fred, or was it Frank?  He was a small-time rancher in the area, with enough cash to leave the ranching to someone else while he came into town for the day.  “Leo Halleck.  He and his friends are…”  Trailing off, he glanced around the table, like he was looking for the right word to come to him.

Something smashed over at the bar; Leo had thrown a glass to the floor.  “Don’t try to give me that pig swill,” he snarled at the bartender, while his friends laughed.  “Bring me the good shit.  You know what I like.”

“Mr. Halleck, that stuff’s expensive,” the bartender said.  His voice was quieter than usual, but still firm, even though his eyes were fixed firmly on the wood of the bar rather than on Leo himself.  “You only paid me half what it’s worth.”

Halleck Jr. just waved that off, leaning in close enough to the bartender’s face to make it an insult.  The bartender actually, physically, cowered back.  “Get the rest from my pa, then, if you’re so worried about it.  I’m not paying for your backwash.”

The bartender scowled, but went for the good stuff and a fresh glass, still fixing his eyes downward.  He finished the pour, tucked the bottle away, and slid the glass to Leo.

“And one for each of my good friends, here,” Leo said, gesturing at the six men behind him with a flourish.  “The sheriff can pay for them too.”

Faraday raised both his eyebrows in surprise, but the bartender just looked resigned, pulling the bottle back out from under the bar—he wondered how likely it was that the sheriff really would pay, provided he believed this had happened in the first place.  Something told him that Leo wouldn’t admit to this happening at all.  “I think I see what you mean,” he said to Frank—or was it Phil?  Fenton?

Good old whatshisname shook his head abruptly.  “No, sir, I don’t think you do.  Leo Halleck has the evil eye, see.”

Faraday raised an eyebrow.  “His gift?”

The boys around the table nodded.  Fenton chanced a look over at Leo’s back, since he and his friends seemed busy over at the bar, and then looked back over at Faraday.  He hunched in on himself.  “Bad things happen if you meet his eyes,” he said.  “And he can sometimes make a man—do things.  Hypnotize him, maybe.  It don’t always work, mostly on the ones who know he’s got powers, but still.  Folks around here don’t look him in the face if they can help it.”

Faraday eyed the man thoughtfully, watching him and his group start getting rowdy.  Rather than throw them out or complain about the ruckus, most folks simply edged away, more than a few more choosing to leave altogether.

Then the man himself turned, and met Faraday’s curious gaze.

It was obvious that the man had a gift.  Looking in his eyes felt a little like staring down a rattlesnake, something sharp and calculating coiled in wait.  Noise fell away.  The bar fell away.  Soon all that was left was Leo Halleck and that stare.  Faraday felt himself go still in response, gut instinct that told him not to draw the attention of a predator, but he couldn’t bring himself to look away and free himself from whatever it was pulling him in.

He was Joshua Faraday, and he’d never backed down from a threat.  When he concentrated, he thought he could make out that bit of the man’s power oozing over him, something slimy and opposing to his own, and he narrowed his eyes and shook it off, like flicking water from his hands.  It wasn’t even hard.

Everything came rushing back in, awareness slapping him in the face, and Leo Halleck was once again some asshole kid with too much power and not enough sense.  There was nothing calculating about him, no threat worth fearing—Faraday doubted he’d ever had occasion to use the guns around his waist, not with a gift like that.  Even poor Teddy Q could probably beat this one to the draw.

Vasquez’s mind-touch prickled at the edge of his awareness, knocking at his thoughts, a hint of concern at whatever Faraday had been broadcasting a moment before.  Faraday nudged back, just a little tap—nothing to see here.

“Well, boys, if you’re not a fan, I’d suggest you get gone,” Faraday said mildly to the rest of the table, not looking away from Halleck Jr.  “He’s coming this way.”

Indeed he was.  His table-mates scattered quicker than seemed possible, and Faraday barely held in the snort of laughter.  Leo Halleck and his boys came swaggering over, all noise and pointless bravado, and surrounded his table, with Leo himself never taking his eyes off Faraday’s.  His power was easy to brush aside, now that Faraday knew its touch.

Vasquez, across the room, was starting to crackle, building up to that habitual fight-feeling.  If things went wrong, at least someone Faraday trusted was standing clear and ready.

“Who might you be?” Leo said, puffing himself up, clearly the lead of his little band.  “Haven’t seen you around before.”

“The name’s Faraday, Mr. Halleck,” he said, casual as he could.  “I’m new to town.  Heard tell about your father and yourself, and it’s a pleasure to meet you.”

“Yeah,” Halleck Jr. said, narrowing his eyes like he wasn’t quite sure if he truly was hearing the sarcasm or not.  “Likewise.”

Faraday could see the wheels turning up in Leo’s head, trying to figure if Faraday knew he was gifted, and how it was the whole ooze of power wasn’t affecting him in the slightest.  Faraday figured it was in his own best interest to offer up a distraction, and shuffled the deck of cards in his hands with a high bridge and a showy cut, drawing every eye around the table.  He couldn’t help the little burst of relief when Leo’s eyes slid away, no longer pressing that slimy gift up against Faraday’s edges.

“Care to play a game or two?” he said, smiling.  Whatever Vasquez was feeling from the whole gang was making him relax, one slow degree at a time, and that meant he could do the same.  “It seems my friends had to head home, and it’d be a damn shame to let such a fine afternoon go to waste.”

* * *

Leo Halleck and his boys turned out to be terrible hands at poker.

* * *

It didn’t take much to start up a winning streak, and that was without cheating.  Drinks kept coming, the bartender apparently convinced to keep providing, but it seemed none of Halleck’s crowd could hold their liquor.  Even without his gift, Faraday wouldn’t need cards up his sleeves or tucked into his pockets to beat a bunch of careless drunks, and he found himself grinning, high on the snap of the cards and the way these men couldn’t keep a steady poker face to save their lives.  Leo Halleck, de-fanged viper in the nest, kept meeting Faraday’s eyes and then subsiding with a sullen look when he casually slipped free.

If he truly did have the _evil eye_ , it seemed his bad luck stare didn’t have much effect on poker games.

Vasquez was laughing.  He could feel it across the bar, a whisper of lazy humor, and Faraday met his eyes in the mirrored glass behind the bar and winked.  If he slid his gaze a few feet to the right, he could make out Leo Halleck’s measly pair of fours in that same reflection.

After a half hour or so, where Leo’s surly expression started to edge into outright good-will, the bar door came open, and Billy and Goodnight came strolling in.

“Finally, the scouting party returns!” Faraday called over at them, raising a hand to wave and an eyebrow at the dust settled into the lines of Goody’s jacket.  “Or a part of it, anyhow.  How was the trip?”

“What was it you called it?”  Goody wandered over toward Vasquez’s corner of the bar but kept addressing Faraday, smiling faintly, with Billy a half-step to the side and half a step behind.  “Taking in the sights?”  As Halleck and his boys all craned their necks to see who was speaking, Faraday took the moment of distraction to gesture at Leo, point two fingers toward his own eyes, and then shake his head, making an exaggerated ugly expression.  By the time anyone turned back to look at him, he’d switched back to his most innocent look.

Goody’s eyebrows barely twitched up, good man, though he dipped his chin a little in response. 

Billy didn’t react at all.  “Scenic,” he said, biting the word out like it’d done him personal offense.

“That’s it exactly,” Goody said, still smiling.  “It was _scenic_.”  He looked over Faraday’s new friends with a placid expression, if one didn’t pay much attention to the sharp glint in his eyes, and even Faraday couldn’t be sure if he was looking Leo Halleck in the eye or just staring into the air an inch or two to the left.  “Well, don’t mind us, boys, carry on with your game.”  The look he turned on Faraday told him, good and clear, not to go causing trouble with the locals.

“Don’t mind if we do,” one of the boys said gruffly.

Leo Halleck turned back around, considered the table, and tossed out a couple coins.  “Raise,” he said. 

For a moment, Billy Rocks was close enough to glance over and see the man’s one pair.  He met Faraday’s eyes and blinked once, slow, before the corner of his mouth tipped up.  Sweet Lord—either Faraday was losing his mind or Billy Rocks was developing a sense of humor.

Still, he sighed and let himself fold, figuring that it wouldn’t hurt to let Halleck win a hand or two to get his confidence back.  It’d be no good to get all seven of them run out by angry townsfolk.

“Can’t say I know what you’re doing associating with one of his kind,” Leo Halleck muttered, after another quick look over his shoulder at Goody and Billy.

“Hm?” Faraday said, playing at ignorance and biting down his scowl.  “Who, Mr. Robicheaux?  He’s a good man.  Damn fine hand with a rifle, too.”

Leo Halleck looked up sharply, midway through collecting his pot.  One of his boys just about choked on his drink.  “That’s not Goodnight Robicheaux?”

“Indeed,” Faraday said, dealing out another hand and wondering how soon was too soon to fold to avoid suspicion.  He let his voice go a touch harder.  “And his traveling companion, Billy Rocks.  Quite the pair, Goody and Billy.”

“Right,” Leo said, nervous, and took the hint.  The conversation moved toward easier things.

* * *

Goody and Billy chatted with Vasquez for a bit, while Faraday kept Halleck and his boys focused on their table, things calming down some now that he’d started to lose time and again.  After another quarter hour, Billy and Goody headed upstairs, and Vasquez pushed up from the bar and headed toward Faraday’s table.

“Come to join in, cowboy?” Faraday said, smiling at him over the three aces in his latest hand, tossing his other two cards back onto the table and accepting two replacements from the squirrely-looking kid acting as dealer for the round.

“Not today, _guero_ ,” he said, smiling back.  He kicked a chair out from a nearby table and settled in it, just close enough to Halleck Jr.’s back to make the man twitch.  “Chisolm wants to meet tonight, decide what we’ll do in the next few days.  _Estarás_ _sobrio_?”

“What’s that?” Faraday said, laughing, slamming back what was left in his glass.  “You know I don’t speak a damn word of Mexican.”

Vasquez’s grin went soft.  “No matter.  I think I can guess.”

It seemed Leo Halleck couldn’t much take being ignored.  “What, like the Chinaman wasn’t enough?” he snapped.  “Now you’re friendly with one of them river-crossing outlaws, too?”

Vasquez went stock-still, like a hunting dog catching the scent.  Faraday put his cards down, nice and slow.  “You have a problem with my friend Vasquez, here?” he said, broadcasting _calm_ as much as he was able and hoping Halleck didn’t push Vasquez past what he could stand, not that Faraday would blame him if he snapped.

Proving the truth of the saying—like father like son—Leo Halleck opened his mouth without a thought for the consequences.  “For all we know, your man’s one of those scum-suckers up in the hills.  What’s to keep him from slitting our throats in our sleep, like the rest of his whoreson countrymen?”

Mind-touch about spitting fire, Vasquez made a sharp movement with his hand, the only reason Faraday didn’t lunge over the table, and then looked at Halleck for a long moment.  Their eyes locked together.  Faraday paused for a second, worried that he’d have to kick at the sheriff’s son under the table until the damn fool kept his power to himself, but Vasquez shook it off in a matter of seconds.  His expression finally settled on dismissive.  “ _Chingate, cabrón.  Es inútil discutir con un pendejo._ ”  One of Halleck’s friends, a short man in a badly-fitted green shirt, flinched.  Faraday wondered briefly if the man understood the language—he’d definitely recognized a couple insults in there, but nothing specific.  Vasquez, meanwhile, pushed himself upright and shoved his chair back where he’d found it.  “ _Guero_ , finish your game.  _Hasta luego._ ”

Faraday paused, halfway out of his own seat, cards already gathered and hat in his hand.  “You sure?”  Vasquez nodded, and Faraday settled back down.  He looked back over at Halleck.  “Alright.  If he thinks he can keep this civil…”

Halleck scoffed.  “Fine,” he said.  “Just keep the damn Mexican away from me and the rest of the decent folk in town.”

Faraday scowled.  “I don’t _keep_ him anywhere.  He does as he likes, and he’s a far better man than you, Halleck.  I’d wager he's a better shot, too, so keep your damn mouth shut.”  Already starting to move away, Vasquez shot him a quick, startled look, something surprised but undeniably fond prickling at the edges of his thoughts.  Faraday fought back an unexpected urge to flush red.

“I’ll take that bet,” Halleck snapped.

* * *

One of these days, Faraday was going to learn to keep his own damn mouth shut.

* * *

“I’m, ah, sorry about this,” Faraday said, eyeing Leo’s friends as they set up in the alleyway, propping up empty cans on fence posts on either side of the street.  “You didn’t exactly volunteer.”

Vasquez bumped their shoulders together, standing loose and easy, apparently unconcerned.  “A bit late for that,” he pointed out.  His power suggested he was laughing at Faraday again, so he couldn’t be too upset about the whole thing.  “It’s only quick-draw.”

A nice, sporting bet: two men facing off, a countdown, and then they both drew and fired at the cans on either side of the street.  The first one to make their shot won.

“What’re the terms?” Leo called out at him, positioning himself.  Vasquez strolled casually over to do the same.

Faraday dragged himself up to a seat on the fence, well clear of the line of fire, and settled the bottle of whiskey he’d begged off the bartender on the railings next to him.  “Well, let’s keep it simple.  If you win, you get my bottle here.”  He picked it up and waggled it, contents sloshing, before setting it back down.  “And when Vasquez here wins, I get yours.”  He gestured over at Halleck’s friend in the green shirt, who was holding a full bottle of his own.

“Seems fair,” Leo said.  “Who judges?”

Faraday shrugged.  “I’m sure one of your boys and I together can manage some kind of fair ruling.”

Leo nodded, and gestured at one of his friends, the squirrely-faced one, who stepped up even while the others bunched up and moved off a little ways.

While they sorted that, Vasquez’s smirk was just for him.  “You trying to be my manager, _guero_?  Split the winnings fifty-fifty, like Billy and Goody?”

Faraday curled a protective arm around his bottle.  “Not a chance,” he shot back.  “You can buy your own drinks, amigo.”

Vasquez didn't so much as roll his eyes; they both knew better than that.

The countdown went quick and easy, Leo’s green-shirted friend with the bottle doing the call.  At the mark, hands leapt to guns; shots went off.  Vasquez’s can hit the dirt an unmistakable second before Leo’s.

“Whatever will I do with all this liquor?” Faraday asked cheerfully, breaking the silence, leaning forward on the fence.  His bum leg protested, so he swayed back instead before he fell right off.  “Two whole bottles all for myself?”

Vasquez grinned cheerfully.  “I can still take one of those off your hands, _guerito_.”

“Not a chance, vaquero.”  The word rocked unsteadily across his tongue.

Vasquez put a hand to his chest.  “Do you not trust me?” he asked, mock-hurt like it wasn’t a ridiculous question.  Faraday had stood back to back with him in a gunfight in the street just days after they’d met, and he’d never once glanced over his shoulder; he’d known nothing was coming from that direction.  If that wasn’t trust, nothing was, and after all these months that much hadn’t changed.

So he just scowled, and clutched his bottle tighter.  “Not with my whiskey,” he retorted.

“Wait,” Leo interrupted, furious and red-faced.  “Wait a goddamn minute.  There’s no way I’m paying off a goddamn cheat.”

Vasquez went from loose-limbed and easy to stiff and furious again in under a second.  “What did you say?”

The late afternoon sky overhead was blue, blue, _blue_ , and Faraday rolled his head back and stared up at it as Leo and his friends started talking over one another, a furious boiling of sound.  “Why did he have to go and say a thing like that?” he asked, not even really sure which one of them he meant, but of course no one answered.

From his spot up on the fence, he watched in calm detachment as everyone began to bristle and square off.  It wasn’t much of a surprise, since tensions were already running high, and Leo was still just as much of an idiot as he’d been ten minutes before.  Leo insulted Mexican women in general and Vasquez’s mother in particular; Vasquez snarled something in Mexican that Faraday didn’t catch but that made Leo’s friend in the green shirt take a step back in affronted surprise.  The man really could understand the language, then.  Interesting.

He didn’t see much need to interfere, not when they all seemed to be enjoying themselves, but then Leo barked, “What do you say we settle this for real?”  Hands inched back towards belts.

Chisolm and Goody had asked them more than once not to go aggravating the locals.  Shooting the sheriff’s son, even if he was a real bastard, probably fell under that category.

“Now, hold on, boys,” Faraday cut in before anyone could say anything else, holding up a hand, “let’s all just calm down a minute.  We’re guests of the sheriff, aren’t we?  And with you being his son and all, well.  It just wouldn’t seem right to go shooting at each other in the street.”  He shook his head, clicked his tongue against his teeth, and did his best to look disappointed.  “And in broad daylight, too.  A real shame.”

“I don’t intend to stand here and let this bastard get away with cheating me,” Leo said, but his hands fell away from his guns and he seemed a little less sure than before.

“I don’t cheat, _cabrón_ ,” Vasquez said, relaxing a little himself.  Unlike Faraday, his disappointment felt real, his mind-touch buzzing quietly.

Faraday tipped his head down so he could roll his eyes unseen under the shade of his hat.  “Well,” he said, dripping reluctance, “if that’s the way you feel about it…”  Vasquez perked up, and Faraday rolled his eyes again.  “You can always settle it one-on-one, like decent folk.  With your fists,” he added, since Leo looked confused.

“That sounds reasonable,” Vasquez said, nodding.  His grin was once again coyote-sharp, showing just a few too many teeth.  Anticipation rose off him like a heat-wave.

Leo looked to his associates for reassurance, and was met with a few shrugs, a few slow nods.  “No weapons, then?  Just our bare hands?”  He looked Vasquez over, and didn’t manage to hide the nervous glint in his eyes.

“That’s right,” Faraday said agreeably.  “Unless you’d rather let the whole thing go.”

His tone strongly suggested that only a yellow-bellied coward would let the whole thing go.

That seemed to stiffen Leo’s spine.  “And you?  Are you gonna try something after I knock your amigo's teeth in?” he said, scowling.  Vasquez raised his eyebrows in lazy offense.

Faraday smirked back.  His personal bottle of whiskey was cheap, but good; he grabbed it up with his left hand and took a long, deep swallow, since there was no chance he'd need to pass it along to Leo when this whole mess was through.  When he leaned back in his seat, his right hand settled on the railing, near enough to his belt to be casual.

And then he smiled his slowest, stupidest smile.  “No need to worry,” he said.  “I’m all for playing fair.”

Vasquez made a sound, quickly muffled.  “Bless you,” Faraday told him serenely.

And then he sat back to let them try to knock each other’s teeth in.

It was fairly well matched, early on—Leo was pretty damn drunk, but Vasquez wasn’t trying all that hard, mostly just ducking and dodging back, broadcasting _fight-fight-fight_ all the while with a smug little smile.

“Come on, V,” Faraday called, getting bored.  “We’ve got places to be.  Can’t hang around all night.”

Vasquez took a step back, enough for both men to drag in a quick breath, and then smirked.  The fight changed—suddenly it was Leo dodging and darting back, trying hard to keep clear of Vasquez as he landed hit after hit.  No matter how he moved, Vasquez was there, still swinging.  It had only been a minute, but there was no way this fight would go on long, and it was already pretty damn obvious who the winner would be.  At least Vasquez had enjoyed himself, Faraday thought, trying not to laugh at the little thrill rattling up his spine.

In Halleck’s little crowd, one boy shifted in place, uncomfortable with the direction of the fight, and shifted to move clear of his boys, edging around so he was mostly behind the two brawlers.  The move caught Faraday’s attention, so he was looking right at him when he reached for his belt—and for his guns.

The damn bastard thought he could shoot Vasquez in the back.  Faraday saw red.

He flung himself off the fence post, leg barely catching his weight underneath him, gun practically jumping to his hand, and fired a warning shot that came so close to the bastard’s ear that he must have felt the wind as it passed.  The fight stuttered to a halt as faces turned his way.

“I’ll only give you one warning,” he said, deceptively light but buzzing with tightly-controlled fury, and was gratified when more than one man blanched to see the pistol still turned their way.  Vasquez looked from Faraday to the idiot who’d thought to get the drop on him, who was still slowly lowering his gun, and understanding dropped over his face like a stone in still water.

The frozen silence that followed was deafening, and Faraday took advantage.

He took a few quick steps forward, drawing up alongside Vasquez and getting between him and the rest of the street.  “What happened to fair play, damn it?  You milksops thought nobody’d notice if you shot a couple strangers in the street?”

Heads shook, nervous glances darting around the group, a couple quiet voices murmuring a negative.  It was one pistol against seven men, and yet nobody seemed much inclined to try him.  He growled, hand tightening on the pistol grip.

“You can relax, _nene_ ,” Vasquez told him, a quiet rumble from just outside his line of sight.  “They know better now.”

 _Nene_ , green-shirt mouthed in the background, raising his eyebrows, but Faraday ignored him.

He held the idiot who’d tried to shoot in his sights a minute longer, just to be certain the lesson would stick.  Vasquez’s mind-touch prodded at him until he sighed and let the barrel drop.  “Get lost,” he told them all, jerking his pistol toward the door back to the bar.  “I don’t feel much like explaining to the sheriff why I had to shoot holes in his only son and all his friends.”

They skedaddled without even a pause for a parting insult, not bothering to pay their debts on the way out.

Before he could consider going after them, Vasquez was there, herding him aside and pushing him down to a seat on the side porch steps.  “I said relax, _guerito_ ,” he said, dropping down alongside and kicking a heel up and over Faraday’s shins to hold him in place when he still seemed inclined to get up and follow along after.  “It’s done.”

Faraday muttered darkly under his breath, but subsided, taking a swig out of his bottle.  It was hard not to listen when Vasquez was a line of heat along his side, broadcasting something quiet and content.  “He was going to shoot you, the rat-faced bastard,” he grumbled.  “That’s no bother for you?”

Vasquez shrugged.  “You were there,” he said, like it was easy as that.

The barroom door opened, and they both glanced over, but it was just Red Harvest, missing his bow and quiver but holding a very familiar-looking bottle.  “They forgot to pay,” he said, and tossed it lightly. 

Faraday almost fumbled it, but managed to empty his hands and make the catch at the last moment.  “You keeping an eye out for us, Red?” he said, glancing down at the bottle that Leo had owed for his loss.  It was something of an amusement to imagine how Red had gotten it off the man in the end.  After a moment, he sighed, and offered it up to Vasquez, who took it with a quiet laugh and cracked it open.  “Thanks.”

Red Harvest shrugged and sat himself up on the side porch railing, looking down at the two of them, sprawled out together on the boards, with a look that Faraday didn’t know how to parse.  “Good shooting,” he said finally, and, “I don’t like cheats.”

Faraday, who was probably further into his cups than he liked to admit, wasn’t entirely sure which one of them the man was addressing.  He took another drink to cover, and at his side, Vasquez did the same, a long swig that drained a good portion of the bottle.

“See, I knew I couldn’t trust you with my damn whiskey,” he grumbled.

Vasquez, leg still tossed over Faraday’s, pressed down a little more weight on that point of contact and didn’t say a word.  His mind-touch wasn’t so quiet.  The man was too damn good at laughing without laughing, in Faraday’s opinion, so Faraday bared his teeth and nudged him in the side none-too-gently with his elbow.

Red Harvest shook his head down at them.  “Idiots.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I spent like 90% of my writing time for this chapter listening to Phil Collins' "You Can't Hurry Love." I'm with Red: idiots. Seriously.
> 
> Translations:  
> Trabajo / ocupación: work, in a general sense. (I'm trying to imply something more like 'job')  
> Trabajo forzado: forced labor (AKA slave labor)  
> Mierda: shit  
> Estarás sobrio?: will you be sober?  
> Chingate, cabrón. Es inútil discutir con un pendejo: Fuck off/go fuck yourself, asshole. It's useless to argue with a moron (more or less. This is probably way more rude than anyone would go in casual conversation at this time, but V is pissed and also used to nobody understanding him anyway)  
> Hasta luego: see you later  
> Cabrón: asshole (more or less)  
> Nene: uh, this is a term of endearment somewhere between honey and baby. It can actually be meant as a casual thing between friends, family, etc, but...probably not. Using nene in this context would be a bit like calling your friend sweetheart out of nowhere and expecting nobody to find it weird


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A couple things:  
> First, to all my American friends: it's been a trying couple of days (understatement) but know that I get it and I love all of you.  
> Second, to everyone: this chapter fought me a lot, but I wanted to get it out sooner rather than later, so here it is. I'll probably be making some minor edits later today, or major ones if there turn out to be serious issues (please let there not be serious issues), but I mean, plot-wise and stuff this is what's happening and we're sticking with it. I am so sorry

By the time the three of them wandered back inside, it was nearing nightfall and the bar was mostly empty.  Leo Halleck and his boys really had cleared out, but it seemed the regulars hadn’t worked up the nerve yet to come back.

It did mean that Chisolm had more room back in his corner.  He’d dragged a second table up next to his usual, which gave them a bit more space, and had planted himself already at the chair in the center.  The last of the seven—Billy, Goody, and Horne—were already seated as well, but the man in the seat of honor next to Chisolm was none other than the white-mustached deputy that had brought Faraday into town.  From the way Red Harvest stiffened at the sight of him, Faraday figured they’d already had the pleasure of an introduction, and Red hadn’t found it all that pleasurable.

“Well, good evening, Sam,” Faraday said, making sure to speak clearly and spreading out his arms. “Was wondering where you’d gotten to.”

“I was about to say the same,” Chisolm told him, dry as dust.  “I heard tell you met with the sheriff’s son this afternoon.  I trust it was a pleasant experience?”  His tone suggested it would go better for them if it had been.

Vasquez and Faraday, each with a bottle tucked under their arm, paused and exchanged glances.  Vasquez looked obviously like he’d been in a fight or two, and Faraday could feel himself swaying slightly on his feet, which meant he probably looked as drunk as he felt—that was to say, very.  Red Harvest slid past them to take a seat, leaving them to their fate.

“Oh, _sí, sí_ ,” Vasquez said.  “Very pleasant.”

“Sure, it was grand,” Faraday agreed, knowing even as he said it that Sam could hear the guilty jump in his heartbeat, maybe smell the lie on his skin.  Then again, maybe the booze-smell would hide that.

“No one was shot,” Red Harvest offered, damning them with faint praise.

Chisolm took it as a win, apparently.  “Good enough,” he said.  “Come on, settle in.  We’ve got the makings of an idea.”

They all took a chair, enjoying the extra table space now that they weren’t all knocking elbows.  Carefully, Faraday tucked what was left of his bottle under his chair, and narrowed his eyes at Vasquez until he did the same.

“So what we have here is essentially a bottleneck,” Goody said, jumping right into the thick of things.  Somebody had sketched out the cave, the curve of the cliff walls, and the hills beyond, as well as the flat stretch between there and the town, and Goody gestured toward the paper as he talked.  Clearly, the others had started without them.  “Far as we can tell, there’s only the one exit, so it won’t take much to keep the situation contained.”

“We can clear off the ones around the front, trap the rest inside, and pick off any stupid enough to try to make it out,” Chisolm added.  “That’s why we’ve got Deputy Abrams here, actually.  I figure there might be some left alive willing to come quiet-like.”

The man shrugged, his mustache twitching with the movement.  Faraday noted his name—he didn’t recall ever being officially introduced.  “If you can catch the bastards, we can hold them,” the deputy said.  “Town’s got a jail, and if needed, we can get a couple U.S. Marshals out here in a matter of weeks.”

“Now, apparently the sheriff isn’t too keen on bothering these local terrors, out of fear their reinforcements out in the hills might take offense,” Goody said.

There went Deputy Abrams’s mustache, twitching again.  The movement didn’t look entirely natural, though Faraday couldn’t figure why any man would use his gift to make his own hair jump.  “He won’t offer any help for those varmints out in the cave, he’s said.  But the way I figure it, if you boys can show just how capable you are at dealing with these kinds of problems, him and the rest of the local law might be more willing to lend a hand with the bigger settlement.  I hear you’re planning on clearing it out either way, so a few extra guns won’t hurt.”

“And we want this done by tomorrow,” Horne said, after a moment for them to process.  It came out only half a question.

Chisolm nodded anyway.  “That’s right.  And since we don’t all feel comfortable killing folks in their sleep, we figured sunset was the next best thing.  If we come around right, they’ll have the sun in their eyes if they feel inclined to start shooting back.”

Goody shifted a little in his seat, and cut a glance toward Billy, who didn’t look entirely pleased.  Faraday figured he could guess who’d voted for the throat-cutting and who’d gone for the shoot-out.  Goody’s instinct for survival crossed oddly with his sense of honor at times.

“So, we move on these ones first,” Vasquez said, thoughtful.

Chisolm nodded and finished the thought.  “And then we head up into the hills and deal with the rest before they have a chance to get organized and retaliate.”

Well, Faraday thought, at least it wouldn’t be a repeat of Rose Creek.  If he never had to weaponize a whole town again, it’d still be too soon.

“Three other towns within fifty miles have all gone bust in the last five, six years,” Deputy Abrams told them.  “Folks abandoned them a little at a time, and now they’re ghost towns.  We’re one of a few that’s managed to hold out, but if we can’t clean out these criminals and stop folks disappearing out on the road, we’re gonna fade out the same way.”  He shook his head.  “I—appreciate your willingness to help us out, gentlemen, even if some other boys around here won’t thank you for it.”

“It’s our pleasure, deputy,” Chisolm said.  Faraday silently agreed—it’d been too quiet these past few days.

Deputy Abrams got to his feet, damn mustache jumping one last time as he smiled amiably.  “You lot are a good bunch,” he told them.  “Quite the leg up on our local gang.  Leo Halleck and his six aren’t much compared to you and yours, Mr. Chisolm.”  He paused.  “Though I have noticed, now that I’ve seen both in the daylight, your Faraday and Leo do look mighty similar.  Bet it really got his goat when you two took him on and won.”

Faraday shrugged, confused and amused in equal turns.  “Well, Vasquez here did most of the work,” he said.

“That, I do think, must have been worse.”  He chuckled as he started for the door.  “Oh, yes, you lot have more skill and more success than that boy will ever know.  Got his goat, I’m telling you.  Got his goat.”  Without a touch, the door swung open in front of him, held itself open until he’d passed, and then clicked quietly shut.

Faraday wasn’t the only one staring after him.  “That man is mighty strange,” he said at last.  “I think I like him.”

“He’s not wrong, either,” Goody pointed out, smirking.  “Sam, you missed it, but the boy does look a bit like our Faraday, here, come to think of it.”

Faraday turned his gaze over to Goody, narrowing his eyes.  “I can’t say I see it,” he said.  “And you didn’t so much as meet the man’s eyes, Goodnight, so I don’t see how you’d know.  Was it the hat?  He does have a hat like mine.”

“No, he really does look similar,” Billy said with a nod.  The corner of his mouth twitched up, just a bit.  “It’s the hair, isn’t it?  And the…”  He gestured at his face, the line of his jaw.

Even Red Harvest nodded along.  “Maybe,” he said.  He tipped his head slowly side to side, like he was considering all the angles.

“No, really,” Faraday said, offended.  “He’s not a thing like me.  Nowhere near as handsome, for one.”

Horne cut in.  “He does look your like,” he said mildly, not bothering to look up from the plate of food he’d pulled out somewhere along the line without a word and was already in the process of devouring.

Well, Faraday thought mulishly, it wasn’t like anyone with eyes would think the same.

“Plenty will agree,” Horne said, before he actually had a change to voice the thought.

“You didn’t even see the man!”

Vasquez clapped him on the shoulder before he could get worked up further.  “ _No te preocupes_ ,” he said cheerfully.  “We like you much better.”

“Can we focus, boys?” Chisolm said, tapping at their little hand-drawn map.  “We’ve got a shoot-out to consider.”

Faraday looked down at the little cave drawn between the bluffs, and sighed, letting it go.  “Think we can find some more dynamite?”

* * *

They headed out just after noon the next day, Faraday guzzling enough water to drown a horse to make his pounding headache die down a little.  It took a couple hours for them all to get into position, since they had to take the long way around.  The cave was across a flat expanse of desert scrubland, so it wasn’t much use to try to head straight for it, since anyone watching would see them coming from a mile out.  Instead, they moved far out to the side, curving around in a broad arch back toward where they needed to end up, trying not to kick up too much dust as horse hooves stirred the loose-packed dirt.

When they were about where they needed to get, they split up.  “You’ll know the signal when you see it,” Chisolm told them, before he and Goody headed off.

“Can’t be a little more specific, huh?” Faraday said wryly.

Horne, at least, didn’t seem to mind.  “He says we’ll know it, and we’ll know it.  How can we miss it when the cornet sounds the call to arms?”

Faraday just looked at him, and then turned toward Billy.  “I did not know that Goody was hiding a trumpet in those saddlebags.”

Billy was laughing with him, or maybe at him, it was hard to tell.  “No, not Goody,” he said.  “He’s got a passable voice, but he couldn’t play a brass horn to save his life.”

“Good thing it’s a call to arms and not a call for mercy, eh?” Vasquez cut in, sharp-edged and thrumming with anticipation.  “Nobody needs saving tonight.”

Horne glowered in the background.

“Quiet,” Red Harvest said, making a short gesture.  He’d led them around toward the back edge of the cliffs, and gestured up toward a narrow scrap of a thing that might generously be called a path.  Red seemed to think they could take it up, over, and back down, coming up alongside the cave entrance without too much trouble.  Faraday was inclined to think they might have some trouble scrambling up in the first place, let alone making it back safely to the ground.

But they managed it, with a little more cursing and sweating than Red Harvest might have liked.  He directed them toward a path they could take back down to ground—which was perhaps a mite more perilous than the one they’d taken up, as if that were possible—and then positioned himself up high, flat on his belly with a view down toward the cave mouth.  Faraday could see the wisps of smoke from the fire, a ways down below.

Very, very quietly, he whistled.  Chances were the bandits below hadn’t heard a thing.  Chisolm, of course, would be able to pick it up if he felt so inclined, and know they were ready and in position.

They waited.  It wasn’t a miserably hot day, for once, with just enough lingering heat in the air to be uncomfortable and not unbearable.  The sun crept down toward the horizon.  Every once in a good while, some louder bit of noise drifted up from the camp below them, raised voices or moving horses reminding them to keep their own voices down.  Faraday, Vasquez, and Billy took seats as best they could on the scraggly little hill of a cliff, pressed together awkwardly on the one flat rock wide enough for sitting.  Horne, who didn’t much care where he was, shifted from foot to foot, muttering to himself and gnawing on a bit of jerky he’d apparently been hiding in his vest for just this moment.

There wasn’t a thing to see out in the desert, but they all kept glancing out that way, waiting for Chisolm’s sign.  All the while, the sun kept dropping.

“When’s this signal supposed to happen?” Faraday muttered to Vasquez, who shrugged.  His mind-touch was still sending out a little low-level buzz of expectation, and it wasn’t helping Faraday sit still.  Billy either, it seemed, since the man had been sharpening his knives for some time and didn’t seem much inclined to stop.  “And simmer down a little, would you?”

Vasquez took a deep breath and blew it out all at once, easing off.  His gift cut out like blowing out the light on a candle.  “Ah.  _Lo siento_ ,” he said.

Faraday did know that one.  “It’s fine.”  He bumped their elbows together.

Horne went stiff, his head jerking off toward the distance.  They all looked that way, but nothing much happened.  “Was that the signal?” Billy said, skeptical.

“No,” Horne said.  “Not yet.”

The sun hit the horizon, a sudden burst of dazzling light reflecting off the pale-white dirt in an unexpected flare of light.  A second after that, there was the unmistakable _crack_ of a rifle shot.

Down below, men started shouting.  The rifle cracked again, and somebody screamed and went silent.  “I’d say that’s the signal,” Faraday said over the sound of that one distant gun going off, again and again.

They all jumped up and moved.  Faraday was right, and that path down that Red had showed them was just as steep and awkward as the one up had been, but out in front Billy had hit on the right idea, keeping his weight low and skidding down in short bursts and quick steps, using his hands to redirect where he needed.  The others followed suit.

About halfway down the hill, it became clear just what Goody and Chisolm had chosen for their distraction.  The bandits were jumping like grease on a hot skillet, spooked by fire from an enemy they couldn’t even see.  Way off, Goody was picking off the ones around the edges, driving them into a tight bunch and starting to get them to edge for cover back in the cave.

Billy and Faraday, the first to hit dirt, used the cover of the confusion to dart through and around the group, dropping a few bodies as they passed—Billy with his newly sharpened knives flashing, Faraday with a couple quick shots.  His stolen guns weren’t anything like his two missing girls, but they were good enough for this.  Vasquez and Horne, who hit the ground a few seconds later, stayed back where they were, so that there were two men on either side of the cave entrance, chivvying the stranglers along in their dive back for cover.

Somewhere out there, beyond any normal man’s sight, Faraday imagined Chisolm leaning over Goody’s shoulder, muttering directions as the man made blind shots that ought to have been impossible.  It was still hard to believe that Goodnight Robicheaux had about as much of a gift as his rifle did when he could do a thing like that without his own two eyes.

A few arrows dropped on the last few remaining, as well as a crackle of lightning, a rumble like thunder that crawled down from on high.  Faraday had almost forgotten Red Harvest, way up on his perch.

That took care of all the men outside.  Faraday poked his head around the mouth of the cave, and jerked back from the shot that nearly scraped his nose clean off.  Gunfire peppered out of the cave mouth, hitting nothing of interest but keeping anyone from trying to move in.

“Well, this might be a problem,” Faraday muttered to Billy.

Billy put his knives away after a few quick flicks of his wrists to clean them off, and then pulled his gun.  “If we just go diving in like this…”

“We’ll catch more than a couple bullets,” Faraday finished.  “Hey, Chisolm?” he called, figuring the man could probably still hear them.  “We need a bit of cover.  Can Goody aim some fire higher up on the other side of the entrance?”

There was a pause.  “What are you thinking?” Billy asked.

Faraday glanced across the way at Vasquez and Horne.  Vasquez was taking the opportunity to aim some blind fire around the corner of the wall, but that wouldn’t last for long.  Horne was practically dancing in place, eager to get going.

Goody’s rifle cracked again, shots whistling past just where Faraday’d asked.  “I’m thinking I go high, and you go low,” he said, and dove into the cave.

“Faraday!” Billy hissed.

From Vasquez, there was a spitting-hot wave of panic, discontent following a beat behind.  He ignored it, coming up on his feet and fanning a couple shots at the bandits still standing, who were only just recovering from their surprise.  He kept his feet planted steady, his body angled so that the setting sun dazzled anyone trying to look directly at him, and trusted that he was better and faster at killing than the ones currently trying to kill him.  Bullets flew past, closer than was comfortable, but nothing managed to hit.  There were some bits of furniture, some curves and edges to the cave walls, and Faraday made sure to keep moving from one bit of cover to the next, never staying still long enough to get pinned down.

“A little warning would be nice!” Billy shouted at him, darting past.  He was a whirlwind, knife in his left hand and gun in his right, sliding and ducking and swaying around bullets as he came right up on those nine or ten men still left intact enough to shoot back, his power giving him near-impossible conviction in his own movement.  Where Billy Rocks was, the bullets would not be.  Horne and Vasquez were a beat or two behind, and with all four against those few remaining, it was all but over.

When things finally settled, there were three left alive: two cowering up against the back, caught between the rocks and Billy and Horne, and one pressed up against the side wall, bleeding from the shoulder.

The one with the shoulder wound took the chance to break for the entrance, stumbling and practically losing his feet before he managed to steady himself at the last second.  He came so close that Faraday could have reached out and snagged the back of his collar as he passed, but what would be the point?

The other two left alive exchanged a look.  “ _No lo perseguirás_?” one asked, looking from one man to the next in the hopes someone would understand.

Vasquez did, and scowled at him and the world in general, jamming his pistols back into his belt with more force than necessary.  “No,” he said sharply.

The one trying to escape made it maybe three steps outside the cave before there was a sharp popping sound, and a flash of light jumped down and caught him.  He jerked with the force of the electrical shock, and then hit the ground.  Just out of sight, there was a _thump_ , and then Red Harvest strolled casually into view, arrow still set to the bow.  “Is that the last?” he said quietly, looking over their two sad-looking prisoners without so much as a twitch.

“Looks like,” Faraday said.  “That didn’t take long.”  Starting to whistle, he took a look around, wondering if anyone left on the ground was the one who’d taken his pistols.

He got some strange looks—and Vasquez in particular was still seething in the background—but a job well done was a job well done, and he wanted his damn guns back.

* * *

Goody was sweating, just a little, easily visible where it soaked into the back of his collar.

They met up outside the cave entrance, and Billy went straight for him, offering up a nod as he took the gun from his hands and emptied it with a few short jerks of his hands.  “Good shooting,” he offered up quietly, and Goody took a deep breath and visibly relaxed.  They had a silent conversation, made up of a few twitches and short hand movements.

“It worked well enough,” Horne said while they settled what needed settling, caught somewhere between cheer and regret.  “Wasn’t much of a fight.”

“What happened?” Goody said, finally looking up and across their little group.  He folded his arms, and it was almost enough to hide the faint tremors running through him.  “Looks like it went successfully enough, so why the long faces?”

Faraday frowned.  “I still didn’t find my guns,” he said.  “I don’t know who’s got them, but they’re going to regret it.”

“Well, I’m sorry to hear that, son,” Goody said, with a hint of a laugh lurking in his voice.  “But I was referring more to why our friend Vasquez here looks like a man just slapped him across the face and he’s not sure what to do about it.”

Come to think of it, it was true.

Horne took that one.  “Vasquez didn’t much appreciate how the situation was resolved in the end.  It turned out better than it might have.”

Faraday shrugged, though he would know.  “It turned out fine.”

Vasquez wasn’t having it, narrowing his eyes a little.  “There was no rush, _guero_.  We could have waited, come up with a better plan.”

“What’s this, now?” Goody said.  “Faraday go throwing himself in headlong again?”

“It was crazy,” Billy said, only partially disapproving.  The rest sounded reluctantly impressed.

“It was _stupid_ ,” Vasquez hissed.

“Why are you pissed?” Faraday said, confused.  “What for, that I got in there and took the bastards out?  It worked, didn’t it?”

Vasquez made a wordless sound, and threw up his hands.  “ _Eres el idiota más afortunado del mundo_!” he muttered.

Faraday scowled, because he recognized _idiot_ , at least.  “Well, what else was I supposed to do?”

“You could try not throwing yourself into the open with no cover, maybe?” Chisolm said mildly, shrugging when that got him a few looks.  It wasn’t really a surprise that he’d seen it, since he’d obviously been listening.  “But it worked, so I can’t say I blame you for it.  Damn nuts, but good work.”

“ _Thank_ you!” Faraday said.  Vasquez looked—and felt—mad enough to start spitting hornets, but didn’t say anything else.

“As pleasant as I’m finding this conversation, mayhaps we can move it along back to town?” Goody suggested mildly.  “I see we’ve got a couple prisoners.”

“Yes, three,” Horne told him.

“Provided the one Red hit is only lightly cooked,” Faraday added.

Chisolm shot him a look.

* * *

They barely made it back to town before full dark, their prisoners tied to a horse each and mostly resigned to their situation.  They dismounted out at the stables behind their bar and boardinghouse, penning up the horses—Jack submitted to this with a minimum of ill-will—and moved on.

“Goody, Horne,” Chisolm said.  “You two want to help me with these three?  We can walk them over to Deputy Abrams at the jail, and get this whole mess wrapped up.  The rest of you can go back, do as you please.”

He eyed Vasquez and Faraday first, like he was thinking about saying something, and then shook his head and glanced to Billy and Red Harvest instead.

Red Harvest nodded.  Billy hesitated, giving Goody a long, searching look.

“It’s fine, _mon cher_ ,” Goody said gently, when Billy hesitated.  With his hands tucked away in his pockets, it was hard to tell if they were still shaking.  “I’ll see you back at the room.”

Billy glanced over at Vasquez, who was glowering like a thundercloud, and then to Faraday, like he was supposed to do anything about it.  “Fine for you, maybe,” he muttered, but nodded and joined them. 

They split up and headed off, three men with their three prisoners and four men with their stubborn silence.  Nobody felt much inclined to meet the others’ eyes, and Faraday didn’t feel much like breaking up the quiet.

They got back to the bar quick enough.  “We’ll go keep watch,” Billy said, gesturing at Red Harvest and leaving no room for argument, not that Red tried.  “You two—”  He looked between Vasquez and Faraday, and apparently gave up on whatever he was going to say.

They opened the door and went in, only to come to a stuttering halt at the sound of shouting, quickly dying off.  Faraday caught something about _damn kids_ and their _damn stupid ideas, ruining things_ , before everything went quiet.  “We interrupting something?” Faraday ventured cautiously, looking between Sheriff Halleck and his son. 

Halleck Sr. looked between them, shaking his head and scowling.  Halleck Jr. was trying to look bored, and mostly just looking nervous, for once not trying to catch anyone’s eyes.  “Not a thing, not a thing,” the sheriff said quickly.  “You cleared out the bandits, then?”

“Yes, sir,” Faraday told him, when it became clear that nobody else was going to speak to the man.  “Chisolm’s got your prisoners for you right now, heading over to the jail.  You could still catch him up.”

Halleck nodded like his head was on a string.  “We’ll just do that, then,” he said, and took a step toward the door.  When Leo didn’t immediately follow along, still looking mighty shifty, the sheriff grabbed him by the arm and dragged him on behind.

The door shut quietly behind them.

“That was odd,” Faraday said quietly, to a general murmur of agreement, quickly dying off.

Billy and Red took the opportunity to disappear quickly up to the roofs.  The mood in the room felt awkward, and Faraday didn’t know how to fix it, other than let Vasquez get it out of his system, and it was still too soon to let himself get scolded for a thing he wasn’t intending to apologize for.  He hadn’t done anything wrong.

“Can’t we hold off on this ‘til tomorrow?” Faraday said into the building silence, running a hand through his hair.  “I’m of a mind to get drunk, not to get treated like a misbehaving child.”

Vasquez sighed, and then shrugged.  “Fine by me,” he said, flat.  He walked up the stairs in silence, boots tapping across the boards and up the stairs, and disappeared into his room without another word.

The door clicked shut behind him.

* * *

Chisolm dragged them all down to the main room sometime in the late morning, where Deputy Abrams and a group of men Faraday’d never met were already gathering, looking over their guns and getting ready.  “We’re headed over to take a look at the settlement,” he said.  “Sheriff and a few more of his boys are following on later, once they’ve got the new prisoners settled and somebody’s sent a message out for the Marshals.  Red, Vasquez, Faraday,” he added, gesturing at them as he named them, “I want you three to stay behind, head over with the latecomers.  I’m told the plan is to head over just after noon, so we should meet up sometime late this evening.”

“You don’t trust him,” Red Harvest said.  “The sheriff.”

“I don’t trust him.  I don’t know most of them,” Chisolm agreed.  “Keep an eye out.  Maybe he’s just nervy—not like anyone could blame him for it.”

“Yes, sir,” Faraday said, with a bit more enthusiasm than he’d given the sheriff the night before, but a fair bit more humor to it as well.

Red rolled his eyes.  Vasquez, who’d normally be laughing right along with him, just sighed.

“Maybe sort yourselves out,” Goody muttered, not so quietly they could pretend not to hear.  Billy elbowed him hard in the side, and he offered an unconvincing grin in apology.

* * *

The room quickly cleared out, a small posse headed out for the hills. 

Red Harvest muttered something about keeping watch, and headed upstairs himself.  On the little balcony overhanging the bar down below, he paused, looking at them, and shook his head.  “Be outside at noon,” he said, opening a door.  “Meet on the street.”  He vanished; Faraday never had figured out how exactly they were all getting from the upstairs out onto the rooftops, but he figured somebody must’ve had a convenient window or something.

He was just wasting time, and he knew it.  Time to deal with the inevitable.

* * *

Faraday wandered over to a table, snagging up a bottle and glass on his way past, and moved over to a long, rectangular table.  He set them down, took out his deck of cards, and took his guns and belt off entirely, piling them all up in the dead center of the wooden surface.  Best not to have any argument armed, he knew, always a good policy even if there was no conceivable universe where he figured this would turn to violence.  The thought was about as laughable as the idea that the sun wouldn’t rise every morning.

“We gonna have that fight now?” Faraday said with a sigh, finally turning to meet Vasquez’s stare without flinching.  He crossed his arms over his chest.

Vasquez didn’t back down.  “It doesn’t have to be a fight.”

That got him a raised eyebrow.  “Really?” Faraday said.  “Feels like you’ve been itching for one since we got done yesterday.  Just in the mood for a friendly chat?”

“ _No te burles de mí_ ,” Vasquez said, mild offense prickling through as his gift brushed against Faraday’s thoughts, and then he shook himself.  “No, no, you’re right.  I am angry.  It was a stupid move, and you don’t seem to understand that!”

“I’m fine,” Faraday said.  “It worked out, like I said.  Nothing happened.”  At Vasquez’s tight glare, he jerked his chin up.  “I am _fine_.”

It didn’t help.  “You’re fine, you’re fine,” Vasquez snapped, running a hand through his hair.  “You’re always fine, _guero_.  _Idiota_.  You could be bleeding to death, and still you say you’re _fine_.”

“Because I am!” Faraday shouted back, throwing up his hands.  “What do you want me to say?  I did what I had to do, and it worked!”

“You could have died, _pendejo_!  Again!”  Vasquez looked a half second away from hitting something.  “That—”  He broke into a steady stream of Mexican, none of which Faraday understood, but the underlying fury was clear.  He punctuated it with some violent gestures that got the meaning across well enough.

“I don’t have the slightest clue what you’re trying to say,” he cut in, just to piss him off.

Vasquez’s mouth snapped shut, and his jaw worked for a second before he continued, slow and clear.  “This,” he said, waving a hand to encompass Faraday, himself, and everything that was happening, “it doesn’t work if you don’t trust us.”

Faraday jerked back.  “You think I don’t trust you?”

Vasquez just looked back, expression dark and angry, mind-touch sizzling sparks.  It didn’t look like he was joking, not like the last time he’d asked that same question.

That was—that was so far from anything he’d considered that it left him speechless.  All his words just—fled, leaving behind a gaping sort of disbelief.  There were obviously things he had never expected from them, because no man was perfect, and no man could _be_ perfect all the time, but he had never once questioned putting his life in their hands.  It wasn’t even playing the odds, not really: he was sure that they were the best of the best, and where that failed, well, he was damn lucky.  He could pass that along.

Vasquez must have gotten that much, because he took pity on him.  “You trust that we won’t shoot you,” he said, not quite a question.  “You trust that we don’t miss our shots.”

“Obviously,” he snapped back.

“You trust that we know what we’re doing?  That you don’t need to dive into gunfire alone.”

“I knew it would work,” Faraday said defensively.  “I knew you’d be right behind me.”

“You say that, but you don’t wait,” Vasquez said, shaking his head.  “You don’t plan for us to come.  You say you trust us, but you only trust that we _can_ , not that we _will_.”

That brought him to a stop.

“I don’t need anyone to rescue me,” he said at last, tipping up his chin.  “I’m _damn_ good at saving myself.”

Vasquez shook his head, and moved forward.  Suddenly he was crowding Faraday in, closer than anyone had gotten in a long time, and Faraday fought hard to keep from flinching away, to hold his ground.  “ _Pinche idiota_ ,” Vasquez said, softer suddenly as all that anger bled away, and when he reached out and grabbed Faraday by the back of the neck it wasn’t hard or cruel, just—solid.  Grounding.  “ _Guero_.  I know that.  You have nothing to prove, _entiendes_?  We see you.”  Very gently, he shook Faraday by the scruff of the neck.  “Let us help.”

Faraday hesitated.  “I don’t—”

Vasquez shook him again, more of a light pressure against his neck than anything else.  “Stop,” he said.  “We’re a team, _sí_?  _No es necesario que corras hacia cada arma que tú ves_.”

There was a long, frozen minute, where Faraday just stared up at him, wide-eyed.  Vasquez stared back.  The moment stretched.

The door slammed open.  Startled, Faraday turned toward it, Vasquez’s hand falling away from his neck.

“Oh, look,” Leo Halleck said, stumbling into the bar.  It looked like he’d been drinking plenty already, though it hadn’t yet gone noon, a half-full bottle tucked under his arm and sloshing with every wobbling step he took.  Faraday wondered if he’d been drinking since he’d argued with his father the night before.  Behind him, his Mexican-speaking friend came scuttling in, wearing an altogether different green shirt.  “It’s the magnificent seven, saviors of the town, heroes of Desert Edge!”

Green-shirt winced.  Vasquez frowned.  Faraday took a slow step back, easing down to sit on the table where he’d left his guns, though it probably wouldn’t come to that.

“What’s this?” Leo said, looking between Vasquez and Faraday, apparently only just registering that he’d interrupted.  His voice was already edging toward a slur.

“Get lost, Halleck,” Faraday said, tired.  “I’m not in the mood for dealing with you.”  He met Leo’s eyes steadily, ignoring the slimy press of the man’s gift as it slunk over him, looking for weaknesses.  The man just could not quit.

The man scowled.  “Aw, upset that I broke up your little lover’s spat?”  Green-shirt winced again.

Faraday twitched, just a little.

“Mind your own business, _cabrón_.”  Vasquez mostly sounded bored.

“It’s not like nobody notices,” Halleck continued, unconcerned.  “Even Sam here caught on quick enough, and the damn man’s bright as a post.”  He gestured at green-shirt, who mostly looked resigned at the insult.  “It’d be sweet, if it wasn’t so damn sickening.”

“What the hell are you babbling about?” Faraday said, folding his arms.

Halleck paused, his eyes slowly widening.  His grip slackened a bit on his bottle, and then his face went mean.  “What, you’re saying _you_ don’t know?” he said, bit-off and sharp.  Green-shirt started wringing his hands quietly in the back, like he was considering interrupting.  “All that—and you two don’t even know you’re doing it.  That’s just all-fired _special_ , isn’t it?”

“Quit talking nonsense, Halleck,” Faraday bit out.  “You don’t know a thing about anything.”

“I know he follows you around like a dog,” Halleck said, that slur growing stronger and stronger.  “Or maybe it’s the other way ‘round, who knows?  The two of you, always—”  He flapped his hand back and forth.  “— _touching_ , hanging off each other like you don’t care what folks think to see it, and you don’t even notice.  You and your boys come striding into town, thinking you’re some kind of damn vigilante heroes, when you’re just a couple of soft-bellied bastards too stupid to tell a skunk from a house cat—”

Vasquez’s mind-touch projected a sharp negative, like nails scratching down along his skin, before he could so much as twitch forward.  At the same moment, green-shirt grabbed Leo by the back of the collar and yanked him back before he could say anything more, eyes flickering between Vasquez’s narrow-eyed stare and Faraday’s simmering rage.  He shook Halleck a little by the back of the neck, like a misbehaving dog.  “ _Está borracho_ ,” he said in Mexican, apparently settling on Vasquez as the more reasonable of the two.  “ _Ignoralo_.”  He ignored the way Leo was spitting curses, low and mean.

Vasquez’s eyebrows jumped up.  He looked for a long time, still with that feeling of _hold-don’t_ scraping along—long enough that Faraday started to shift a little from foot to foot while he waited.  Finally he nodded.  “ _Vete_ ,” he said, with a sharp gesture toward the door.  “ _Y manténgase alejado de mí y el mío._ ”

Green-shirt dragged Halleck out, nodding seriously all the way.  They almost stumbled over the doorframe, but made it through without incident, the door latching shut with the kick of a boot behind them.

Faraday let out a harsh breath between his teeth.  “I don’t want to clap eyes on that yellow-bellied piece of trash for at least a week,” he muttered to himself.  His gun belt he left where it was, tossed haphazardly over the center of the table, but he picked up his cards, needing the familiar reassurance between his hands.  He kept his eyes down on them as he made them dance.

Vasquez, though, just kept looking at him, stare boring holes into the side of Faraday’s head.  It felt uncomfortably like how they’d started the conversation, minutes and years before.  “Halleck, what he said, it made you uncomfortable.”

Faraday twitched.  “What, like it didn’t bother you any?” he said, cutting his eyes toward him and then away.  “Him poking and prodding at us, saying all that shit?”

Vasquez shrugged, the motion catching at the corner of his vision.  “Maybe,” he said.  “But only because it was no business of his, what we are.”

Faraday looked over at him finally, scowling.  “Hold up now, not you too.  What’s that supposed to mean?”

Vasquez shrugged again, apparently wordless.

“I don’t understand you,” Faraday said, frustrated.  He put his cards down, and then his hands felt strange and empty, so he settled for pulling at his hair with one hand and clutching at the table behind him with the other.  He thought he could hear his knuckles creak.  Something was fluttering up against his ribs, and it felt an awful lot like panic.  “What do you want?”

Vasquez looked—his face was doing something, really something, that was for sure, as he took a step forward.  Faraday couldn’t quite help the instinctive flinch back.

Still, it got Vasquez to back off a little in response, his hands going up.  “Oh, _guero_ ,” he said, soft and fond and a little bit sad.  “Don’t you know?”

He bared his teeth.  “Would I be asking if I did?”  It came out too sharp.

Vasquez shook his head and took another step back; seemed that neither of them quite believed it.  “ _Es increíble_ ,” he said, “that you run straight at gunfire, but you won’t do this.  _Talk_ to me.”

Faraday bit down hard on his tongue around his gut reaction, which was to open his mouth and say _but the worst a gunshot could do was kill me_.  He refused to let himself understand what that meant, and stayed quiet instead.

Vasquez forced out a laugh at however that thought had translated for him, a little quiet and a little mean, and the sound hurt, same as the skittish way his power scratched against Faraday’s skin as it pulled away.  He didn’t like it.  Vasquez had never been shy about using his gift, though he was always perfectly polite, with never so much as a whisper of a feeling before he knocked at the door a little to ask permission.  Feeling him pull back was—it wasn’t—he didn’t _like_ it.

“What do you want from me?” he asked again.  If ever there was a moment for Vasquez to read his mind, this was it: all those bits of confusion and not-fear and the beginnings of something hurt were rattling around in his head, he didn’t know what half of it meant, and he couldn’t just up and walk out the door to get out of the conversation.  Maybe a professional mind-reader could figure what it all was about.  Except it seemed like Vasquez was waiting him out, waiting for some sign that Faraday didn’t know how to give or even if he’d want to, because the damn vaquero wouldn’t give him a hint.

It’d be nice if his own gift could make itself useful for once, but he didn’t have a knack for getting himself out of uncomfortable situations.

Outside in the square, the church bell tolled high noon.

Well, that’d do, too.

Vasquez sighed as he realized the same thing Faraday had, or maybe just as he recognized the rush of relief Faraday had felt for what it was.  “Nothing,” he said, flat and tired, and it took a second for Faraday to realize that was the answer to his question.  “ _Vamos._ We should leave.”

“Right,” Faraday said, fighting the urge to fiddle with his hands, with his deck of cards.  “Can’t keep them waiting.  I just—ah—need to fill up my bottle, and we can go.”

“ _Bueno_ ,” Vasquez said with a wave of his hand, and for a second or two Faraday thought maybe it was all fine.  “I’ll wait outside.”  And then he went to leave, moving toward the barroom exit, toward the alley and the quickest path to the stables.

Faraday was directly between him and the door, but Vasquez didn’t walk toward him, didn’t brush past him with a smile.  Instead, he went circling around to put an extra table between them, casual as anything, without another word.  The door closed behind him, not loud enough to be a slam and not gentle enough to be overcautious, and then it was just Faraday and his empty bottle, his guns and his cards scattered across the table, and too much damn quiet.

He felt uncomfortably like Vasquez had caught him in a bluff he hadn’t known he was making.  Problem was, he wasn’t sure if he was disappointed or not that nobody had called.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> NEXT CHAPTER WILL BE POSTED EITHER LATE SATURDAY OR SOMETIME SUNDAY. ONCE AGAIN I AM SO SORRY.
> 
> Translations!  
> No te preocupes: don't worry about it  
> Lo siento: sorry  
> No lo perseguirás?: you aren't going to chase him?  
> Eres el idiota más afortunado del mundo: you are the luckiest idiot in the world  
> Mon cher: my dear (ah, Goody and his Cajun French! Is it an endearment or just a speech tic? Not-so-spoiler alert: it's an endearment.)  
> No te burles de mí: don't make fun of me  
> Idiota: idiot  
> Pendejo: in this case, a meaner version of idiot  
> Pinche idiota: fucking idiot, or the meanest version of idiot so far!  
> Entiendes?: do you understand?  
> No es necesario que corras hacia cada arma que tú ves: So I think my translation skills here got a little more iffy than usual, but this SHOULD be "You don't need to run toward every gun you see." Bleh.  
> Cabrón: bastard  
> Está borracho. Ignoralo: He's drunk. Ignore him.  
> Vete: go away  
> Y manténgase alejado de mí y el mío: And stay away from me and mine  
> Es increíble: it's incredible  
> Vamos: let's go (to somewhere)  
> Bueno: good (BUT IS IT REALLY V? IS IT REALLY)


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to all of you leaving kudos/comments!!! For those few who've been especially awesome and encouraging (you know who you are), I love you all to death. I'm doing my best to respond to all of the comments I get (because I love how sweet and wonderful you all are, it makes me feel all squooshy inside). Also, if you do catch any weird things or mistakes, guys, feel free to let me know. I keep catching little typos and stuff that I fucked up since I'm pretty much slamming this straight from brain to AO3 without pause for editing, and I am very embarrassed. I am, in fact, ashamed. I have standards, I swear.
> 
> If you have any questions/comments/speculations, feel free to bring them up here, or ask for my Twitter handle if you want to do it that way. I'd love to talk to you all! Next chapter up in the next few days, as always, NaNoWriMo and life permitting.

It probably wasn’t the best time for a drink, but he’d never let that stop him before.

He didn’t even have his damn bottle, the little travel-sized thing that he’d taken off Teddy Q back before Rose Creek and kept for reasons he’d go to the grave swearing weren’t sentimental.

There was nothing to keep him from thinking about the conversation they’d just had, but he put it out of his mind, trying to get back to a place where he could join Chisolm and the others for a fight and not get himself or anyone else killed.  Soon enough, someone would come back in to get him, probably more than a little pissed at how long he was taking, but there was still a little more time before that happened, and he’d take every last second of it for himself.

He got up and moved a little way down the table so he could reach the deck he’d abandoned up in the center, resting it comfortably between his palms and between his fingers.  Slowly, thoughtfully, he headed back and threw himself back in a chair down near the end, starting to fiddle with the cards and trying to ground himself in them.  But they didn’t want to dance, heavy and unwieldy when he tried to get them to move.  There was no spark, not a hint of his gift, nothing alive to catch him up and draw him higher and higher.

He took another swig straight out of the bottle and resisted the urge to put his head in his hands.

* * *

The door facing out toward the main street opened, and Faraday, who had expected Vasquez to come back in from the alley or Red to come down from the roof, turned around to look.  The only problem was that it wasn’t either of them; it was Sheriff Halleck, stone-faced and serious-looking.  A number of men, eight or so, shuffled in behind him, too well-armed to be coming along for just a visit.  Most kept their faces blank, but one or two near the back looked decidedly shifty, glancing around the room and toward the doors like they needed the reassurance that no one else was around.

“Sheriff Halleck,” Faraday said, and covered his immediate tension by taking another drink, this time out of his glass.  It was difficult to keep his eyes from cutting toward his gun belt where he’d left it a ways down the table, even after he’d gone and picked up his cards.  Damn.  “We were meeting you up at the jailhouse in just a bit, weren’t we?  What brings you here?”

“Just a quick chat before we head out, Mr. Faraday,” the sheriff said, pasting on a half-hearted smile.  Had it only been such a short time since Chisolm had said he didn’t trust the man?  “But you’re all alone, I see.  Where are the others?  That Mexican—Vasquez, right?  And the Indian.”

Faraday made a show of looking around the obviously empty room.  “They’re out,” he said.  “Planned on meeting up with you across town.”  He waved a hand, trying very hard not to glance toward the upstairs or the door to the back room, with its exit to the alley.  Even he wasn’t sure if it’d be a help or a hindrance to have Red Harvest or Vasquez come busting in on this discussion.  “Something I can help you with?”

“Ah, just a quick chat,” the sheriff said again, shifting in place.  He glanced at his men, but they seemed content to let him be the one to speak.

Faraday’s glass made a heavy sound when he set it down, and he let his eyes trail slowly across the sheriff’s men around the room.  They were spreading out, slowly but surely, and doing a terrible job of making it look casual.  A couple of them wore deputy badges, polished to a shine, but most didn’t, and that meant nothing good.  “A chat?  About something in particular?” he said, and rose calmly to his feet.  At least half the men twitched, and he raised his eyebrows at them, even as he settled in with his hip leaning against the table, another foot closer to his guns.  He kept the bulk of the wood surface between him and the rest of the room.  “The weather, maybe?  Local crops?”

Halleck ignored his attempts to joke, and apparently gave up on deception altogether.  “I’m not particularly proud of this, Mr. Faraday,” he said.  “I’m not a perfect man, and I’ve made a few mistakes.”  His hand dropped slowly, hovering over his gun.  “Nothing against you personally, of course, but I’m going to need you to come with us.”

Faraday let his voice stay easy, undisturbed, while he straightened back up and did his best to look like a man without a purpose.  “Come where, exactly?”

The sheriff’s voice and face hardened imperceptibly, but the way his hands shook betrayed the lie for what it was.  The man was damn nervous and trying to hide it.  “We’ll be going for a walk.”

“Surely you don’t think nobody’ll notice if you walk me out of here at gunpoint,” he said, waving a hand expansively.  Eyes tracked the movement, but not so much the way he shifted again on his feet, always inching toward his weapons.  It was a delicate dance between their distraction and his own carelessness—too much of one and not enough of the other would get him shot before he could sneeze.

 _Look at my hands_ , he thought.  _Come on_.

The sheriff—smiled, against all odds.  And then Faraday felt a rush of something like vertigo, a strange, distant feeling sweeping over him, vaguely familiar.  Everything felt unimaginably small and unimportant, and he relaxed into a slouch against the tabletop all at once, like cutting the strings on a puppet.  Back in his vest pocket, he could feel his deck of cards buzzing quietly, but it was like seeing a hornet nest from a good ways off.  It was worth noting, but not worth concern.

Why had he been worried, again?  What had he been doing?

“Sheriff,” one of the boys with a badge grunted, looking pale.

The feeling cut off as quickly as it’d begun.  Faraday jerked upright like he’d been prodded with a hot iron.  “Sorry, fellas,” Halleck said, wincing.  “Didn’t mean to catch you up in that.  Got a bit carried away.”

“Hell fire, that was strange,” Faraday muttered, pressing one hand to his chest.  His cards, familiar and safe, thrummed a little under his palm, alive once more, and he pulled at his gift until it built up in the deck and stuck there, grounding himself as best he could in what was.  He’d bested Leo’s evil eye; he wouldn’t let the sheriff’s tricks get the best of him.  Tricks, after all, had been _his_ trade first.  “Your gift’s about as shifty as your son’s.”

Halleck scowled at that.  “There’s no need to forget your manners, Mr. Faraday,” he said, like he wasn’t in the process of a kidnapping.  He shook himself all over and visibly forced himself to calm.  “Like you just saw, it won’t matter who sees what.  My gift is a matter of perception.  Folks see what I want them to see, and believe what I want them to believe about it.  I’m in control of this room for now.  Nobody outside’ll have a clue what’s happened here.”

Well, at least it explained why Vasquez hadn’t felt the building tension and come bursting through the back door already.

He could try and fight.  He was damn good, and he knew it, but there was no way he was good enough to take down nine men armed and at the ready without even the questionable cover of the bar.  He certainly couldn’t manage it with his guns half a table away; before he finally reached them, even the slowest on the draw would have the time to shoot twice.

That being said, there was no way he was going to just give up and go along nicely.  And without his guns, he still had what he always did—quick wits and quicker hands, and the ability to stir up a ruckus like no one else.  His hands slid forward good and slow, because twitching just now was a good way to get shot early, until he could rest them casually on the table.  He cursed himself again for not putting the damn belt back on.  It was such a stupid, amateur way to die.

Finally dropping the charade, he let his expression go mean.  “And what if I’m feeling uncooperative?”

The adrenaline in the room spiked up a notch.  “It wouldn’t be your best idea, son.”  Halleck shook his head, frowning like a disappointed preacher.  “Can’t we go about this civil-like?”

Faraday smiled, and knew it wasn’t pretty.  “You and I have differing ideas on civil behavior.”

Tension ramped again.  Faraday felt the moment coming, squaring his stance and getting ready, letting his fingers press lightly against the tabletop.  Something buzzed along the line of his spine, sparked invisible between his fingertips, and he had less than no clue what would happen next, but he was ready to roll the dice and find out—

“ _Oye_ , what’s taking so long?” Vasquez’s muted voice broke the standoff as the man came through the alley door into the back room, carrying from beyond the closed barroom door as footsteps moved across the wooden boards.  “ _Ándale_.  We’re already late.”

Faraday’s eyes went wide.

“Shit,” he breathed, knowing with the sheriff’s gift it wouldn’t make a difference even as the man and his cronies all turned toward the sound.  “No, don’t—!”

The door slammed open.  Vasquez, who had just reached up to light a fresh cigar, looked—and felt—suddenly, horribly surprised.

A lot of things happened at once.

Vasquez went for a gun, but he was off-guard and clearly not expecting any trouble, his hands still full.  Faraday dove forward across the table, gift sparking at his fingertips, his belt leaping toward his hands even as he leapt for it in turn.  The sheriff shouted, a startled, wordless sound.  Every man in the room pointed a weapon, but it was a young-looking kid with a deputy’s badge nearest to the door who took aim, and he and Faraday fired at practically the same moment.

The deputy screamed and clutched his newly perforated hand, his gun clattering on the wood floor, but Faraday didn’t give a flying shit about that piece of trash.  Vasquez, on the other hand, jerked sideways with the force of the shot and went down, bouncing heavily off the back wall of the bar before landing hard out of sight in a shower of shattered glass and  splintered wood.

There was silence, except that damn deputy sobbing like a child, where everyone froze.

“Vasquez?” Faraday called, to no response.  “Hey, _Vasquez_.  Come on.”  No movement.  No sound.  No prickling whisper of a mind-touch reaching out.

The silence turned ominous, then deafening.

For a long moment, all he felt was a sort of stunned disbelief.  “No,” he managed to choke out.  “Damn it all, _no_.”  Shifting, he sucked in a heavy breath between his teeth, letting it out in a rattlesnake hiss and refusing to let his numb hands drop his guns.  “You sons-of-bitches,” he said slowly, the words twisting into a snarl on the back of his tongue.  There was nothing threatening about a man sprawled out across a dirty barroom table, but he had his reputation and his righteous fury, and half the room took a gratifying step back.  “You dirty cowards—you bunch of bastards.  I am going to _gut you like goddamn fish_ —”

He jerked forward, gun trained on the walking dead man who’d fired the shot, and was pulled up short by a roomful of weapons pointed at his face, hammers popping back.  He froze in place.  His heart was pounding heavy and loud in his ears, his face twisting into a snarl like some kind of wild thing.

Guns in hand, cards in his pocket—he was all weapons loaded and electric in his rage, eleven bullets left in his guns and only nine men to kill.  Oh, he could do it, he could feel it, and even if he couldn’t maybe it would be worth it.  Maybe it would be better.  Maybe anything would be better than thinking about the sound a body made when it hit the floor.  And not just a body, anybody, but somebody who he’d talked with and fought with and smiled with, somebody who’d gotten closer than anybody’d ever come before.  And he’d let it happen, hadn’t he?  He’d let the man move into his space, press up against him, affection and companionship and something more, and it’d seemed so easy—

 _Oh, hell,_ he thought wildly, not sure what it was twisting up his throat, only that he hated it.  _Oh._   It was a hell of a time to decide he knew what Leo had meant, after all.

“Damn it all, boy,” Halleck snapped, drawing him back.  “This is what I was trying to avoid!”  He jerked his head at one of the men who hadn’t been shot, never taking his eyes or his gun off of Faraday.  “Brady, check on the Mexican,” he ordered.  When the man hesitated, the sheriff scowled.  “You’re the doctor, aren’t you?  Do as I say!”

The man, a rat-faced and weedy thing, hurriedly put up his gun and scuttled behind the bar, ducking down out of sight.  Faraday held himself perfectly still and barely resisted the urge to just start shooting, trying to convince himself it wasn’t worthwhile when everything in him said otherwise.  The coward of a man who’d done it, that man was still trembling in his sights, staring back at him.  They were obviously thinking the same thing.

Six pounds of pressure.

“He’s alive, sheriff!” Brady called, popping up from behind the bar, and Faraday’s grip tightened instinctively around his gun before relaxing slowly, so slowly.  He didn’t move at all otherwise.  “It’s a bleeder, but it’s just through the meat of the shoulder.  Man must’ve hit his head on the way down.”

Relief was a luxury he couldn’t afford; it was a sickening rush that threatened to take the legs out from under him, even when he wasn’t standing.  He clawed it down, pushed it away to deal with it later.  Thank god, thank luck, thank whatever the hell was watching that he still could.

The shivering deputy, clutching at his bleeding hand, looked as if he’d been given a stay of execution.  Sheriff Halleck, meanwhile, tried on his best conciliatory expression.  “See, now, there’s no need to lose your head,” he said to Faraday, gentling his voice like a man trying to calm a spooked horse.  “Your man’s just fine.”

“And he’d damn well’d better stay that way,” Faraday snapped back without thinking, and could have kicked himself an instant later for the obvious tell.  Sheriff Halleck saw it too, if the sudden gleam in his eye was any indication.

“Well,” Halleck said, starting to smile, like any man who recognized a winning hand when he saw one.  “How about this, son?  You put down your weapons and come quietly, and we can put an end to this…unpleasantness between us.”  When Faraday only grimaced and bared his teeth, the sheriff sighed.  “The way I see it, you shot my man, and he shot yours.  That makes us even.  Don’t be stupid, Faraday, and there won’t be any more violence.  You understand?”

When the time came, he was going to make this snake swallow his bullet.

But it wasn’t time, not yet.  Faraday let the pause stretch a second longer than was comfortable, and then slowly tipped his pistol up to point safely at the ceiling, sliding his finger off the trigger.  “Yes, _sir_ , Mr. Halleck.  I think I can recognize a threat when I hear one.”

“Take whatever he’s got,” the sheriff said, gesturing to two of his men, who looked between each other warily before moving to obey.  Faraday let them, standing stock-still while they checked him over, and kept his stare solidly on the sheriff.  He couldn’t look toward the bar and still function.

Halleck tried to look back, but couldn’t manage it for long.  He shifted on his feet.  Meanwhile, the idiots finished checking his pockets and decided he was clean.  He didn’t bother to tell them they’d left his cards, and missed the second knife in his boot.

He’d make them regret it.

There was a sudden ripping sound, and Faraday glanced over to find rat-faced little Brady ripping off his own shirtsleeves and ducking down behind the bar again, muttering something about bandages.

 _Well_ , Faraday thought, pleasantly surprised.  _A real doctor after all_.  When he killed the rest, maybe he’d only shoot Brady a little.

“Now tie his hands,” Halleck said.

They were even more reluctant to try that one, but he clenched his hands into fists and let them do it.  It wasn’t just for show; no matter how tightly they tied the ropes, they’d loosen up once he relaxed.

Halleck nodded firmly once it was done.  “Let’s go,” he said, gesturing at his men.  “You coming quietly, Faraday, or are you making this difficult on yourself?”

Faraday sighed and then paused.  The hairs on the back of his neck stood on end.  From far off, almost too faint to notice, there was the smell of ozone and electricity, and Faraday knew what that meant.  He tilted his head slowly back and to the side, trying to make the move seem casual, and looked up, and up, and up.

Red Harvest, perched precariously up in the second-story rafters, nodded down at him.

Faraday shook his head slowly, already looking away before anyone could follow his eyes.  “I’ll come quietly,” he said.  “But you shot one man and shanghaied another.  Someone’ll follow us, and it’ll all catch up to you eventually.”

Hopefully, Red would get the hint and track him down, once he’d checked up on Vasquez.  Faraday could go along with this for now, and maybe he’d be able to get some straight answers for once.  He was getting tired of sitting around in the dark, and at the very least they weren’t covering his mouth.  He could talk any man into anything, given enough time and incentive, and it seemed he had a bit of both.

This could work.

* * *

He caught a glimpse of Vasquez as he passed: too pale, too still, blood already staining the cloth bandages pulled tight over his shoulder.  Something in his chest wrenched at him at the sight, but at least he was still alive.  That’d have to be enough.

* * *

Dragging himself onto a horse with his hands bound was an adventure and a half, but his captors were willing enough to prod him along until he was mounted up with the rest of them.  The reins were out of his hands, just a long lead tying him to the horse of one of the strange men not wearing a badge, but his hands were in front of him and he could at least cling to the pommel if needed.  Wild Jack screamed at him as they rode by his pen, but Faraday let out a sharp whistle and he subsided.  Halleck gave him a strange look that Faraday shrugged off.  “Possessive horse,” he said, like that explained anything, and Halleck let it be.

They rode out of town, hooves beating up the dust, and Faraday had to resist the urge to look back and wait for a sign that someone was coming after him.  If Red wanted to track him, it wasn’t like he’d notice anyway.

Brady, the doctor, rode up alongside the fool of a deputy with a hole still in his hand.  It seemed he had some kind of gift, because he gave the thing just a cursory glance and a thin wrap before something pale green sparked up under his fingertips.  He glanced back at Faraday as he did, and nodded when he saw him watching, gaze intent.  Well, if he had a gift for healing, that boded well for Vasquez, and also for Faraday’s inclination to let the man live.

God, Vasquez.  The sheer magnitude of what he wasn’t allowing himself to think on was starting to crush him.

Some time passed in silence before Faraday broke.  “So what the hell do you need me for, anyway?” he said, exasperated.  “Judging by the way folks around here can’t seem to keep their hands off me, I figure something’s up.”

“You’re filling the terms of a bargain I’ve made with the Mexicans,” Halleck said stiffly.  He was riding just ahead and to the side of Faraday’s horse, like he couldn’t quite bring himself to look at his captive.

Faraday thought about that one.  “You made a bargain with the _bandits_?” he said.  “For _me_?”

“Not exactly,” the sheriff said.  He glanced back.  “They’re not bandits, for one thing.  They’re people-smugglers, sending folks over the border into Mexico for, uh, free labor.  And you’re not the payment, precisely.  Just…coincidentally.”

Faraday scowled at him, not exactly surprised.  Vasquez had been right, and that was awful, it was, but mostly Faraday was pissed off that Halleck had sent four of his friends out to deal with human traders without telling them what they were walking into.  Wherever Chisolm, Goody, Billy, and Horne were, nothing good was happening, and he couldn’t even warn them.  Hopefully Horne’s gift had kicked in once they’d left town.

Whatever the case, this wasn’t the time to worry about it.  “You can’t be planning to send me to death or hard labor without explaining the thing more than that.”

Halleck, for some reason, seemed inclined to give him that much.  Maybe he felt guilty for the whole thing, who knew?  “I’ve been working with them, you see,” he admitted, seemingly unconcerned with the idea of it.  “They’d been running up and down the border, clearing out homesteads and settlements.  Folks were just disappearing without a trace, and nobody’d a clue where they’d all gone.  Three towns went completely bust, did you know?  These gangs were cleaning them out, and the rest fled to avoid the same.  And then folks started to disappear here in Desert Edge.”

He paused.  Faraday, who was starting to see the shape of the thing, sucked in a sharp breath and waited.

“I could have gotten the Marshals in to clear up the whole mess, but by that point these damn gangs would have destroyed the town and taken everyone in it worth taking up and across at the border,” Halleck said.  “Desert Edge was one of the biggest settlements in the region, and closer to the rest of civilization, but not quite close enough.  I told the Mexicans that if they left us alone, I wouldn’t send in a report to the U.S. government, and they’d be able to do their work up and down this section of the border without interference.  In exchange, all they had to do was leave this one little town alone.”

“And nobody questioned it?” Faraday said.

The sheriff shrugged, like it didn’t matter much to him.  “We tell folks they’re thieves, and the rumors take care of the rest,” he said.  Goody, Billy, and Horne had discovered as much just by asking around town.  “Oh, we pretend to drive them out every once in a while, just to keep up appearances, but as long as they leave the town and the closest homesteads be, we leave them be in turn.  They steal a thing or two here and there, and nobody questions much of anything.”

Faraday cut a glance over at him, unimpressed.  “And I’m sure you get a pretty little cut of the profits, as well,” he said, raising an eyebrow.  “People run pretty damn expensive these days, now that slavery’s outlawed here and in Mexico.”

Halleck shrugged, like it was no matter.  “Like I said, I’ve done things I’m not proud of,” he said.  “But I’m the reason this town’s still alive.”

“Asshole,” Faraday muttered, probably quiet enough the other man wouldn’t hear.  He nudged his horse with his heels so it moved a little quicker, pulling up alongside the sheriff.  The man holding the lead glanced back at them, but when Faraday didn’t try much else, he let it go.  “That’s great and all, but what’s it got to do with me, Halleck?”

Halleck shrugged expansively.  The man didn’t seem at all bothered by all the bile and hot air passing through his lips.  “I love my son, Mr. Faraday, but he’s not always the brightest.  He’d heard about these so-called bandits camping out now and again in the hills, and assumed the reason I hadn’t run them off was because I couldn’t, not that I wouldn’t.  He went out with his little gang and took out four or five of the Mexican bastards while they were sleeping, but the rest woke up and ran him and his off.  It wouldn’t be much of a problem, except he told them his name.”

Faraday rolled his eyes, because he didn’t much care that Leo was as big of an idiot as he’d seemed.  “Like I said, what’s that all got to do with me?” he said.

“See, the problem is the Mexicans decided I’d broken the deal and that they wanted repayment.  Said they’d come in and destroy the town if I didn’t.  But they wanted my son, and I wasn’t much inclined to give him up.  That put us at a bit of an impasse, didn’t it?”

“And we all know the Mexicans always win in a Mexican stand-off,” Faraday said, dry as dirt.  “Still nothing to do with me.”

Halleck nodded along.  “It wouldn’t have touched you at all,” he agreed, “excepting that you both travel in a group of seven, you both were in the area, and you look mighty similar in the dark.”

It clicked, and Faraday resisted the urge to bash his forehead down against the pommel of his saddle.  “Damn it all,” he said.  “Sam was right.”  He gestured wildly with both tied hands, since he wasn’t steering and it didn’t matter anyway.  But he was furious—they really had been looking to take one man and one man only, and he’d been in the wrong place at the wrong time.  “Was that you and yours, then, back when I first got shanghaied outside of town?  With gifts like yours and your son’s, it’d be an easy thing to get me out of camp.”  Except maybe not, because he’d proved pretty damn resistant to Leo Halleck’s powers and the sheriff’s gifts were still pretty memorable, once they were no longer in use.

Sheriff Halleck shook his head, confirming that much.  “No, not us.  We hadn’t thought that far ahead yet.  That was one of the Mexicans—we call him Piper.  He’s got…”  Halleck waved a hand, one of those wiggling hand gestures that meant a power of some kind.  “You’ve heard of the Pied Piper?”

Faraday shrugged.  “More or less.”  He remembered something about a town’s worth of kids getting lured out of town without anyone else the wiser, or something of the sort.  It hadn’t exactly stuck with him.

Halleck nodded.  “Like that.”

The sheriff was closing off again, his guilt apparently soothed.  It seemed that it didn’t take much.  “You’re an idiot and a fool, sheriff,” Faraday told him quietly, and didn’t flinch when the sheriff cut a sharp look his way.  “You’ve started a war you don’t know how to finish.  You think they’re going to just take me and let the whole thing go?  What happens if they figure I’m not the one they’re looking for?  What if they just decide to take me and destroy the town anyway?”

“We’ve worked together well enough in the past,” the sheriff insisted.  “They’ll take the bargain, and now that some’ve seen your face, they’ll believe you’re the right man.”

Faraday snorted.  “But we’ve poked the hornets’ nest anyway, now that we’ve cleared out the cave near town.  Why not just let us help end the whole thing now?”

The whole thing smacked of desperation, only the barest hint of logic mixed up with a whole lot of nonsense.  Faraday couldn’t believe the man had gotten anyone to go along with it, let alone the eight still traveling with him, but maybe they were getting paid same as him.  Maybe they were just stupid enough to believe the sheriff was making anything like sense, or young enough to get scared into it, or blackmailed like the Mexican bandits.  It wasn’t like it mattered.

“Too late for that,” the sheriff said, caught between forced cheer and anxiety.  “I let them know your boys and mine were coming.  If it isn’t over by now, it soon will be.  That’s half my problem solved.”

Faraday spit at him before he could think better of it.  “You’re a damn idiot,” he said again.  “Me and mine won’t go down as easily as all that.”

Horne would know.  Chisolm would hear.  Billy would never die so quietly, and Goody was smart and all-fired impressive at wriggling out of a tight spot, with or without his rifle.  And Vasquez had Red Harvest, and the two of them both had their freedom.

“We’ll see who’s right when it’s all over,” the sheriff said stiffly, wiping his face dry, and sped his horse up until he pulled ahead and out of Faraday’s reach.

* * *

They rode for the next few hours in complete silence.

* * *

They came to a stop just an hour or so from sunset, way beyond anywhere Faraday recognized from his travels, in front of a little wooden cabin with one door and no windows.  There was a hitching post outside, and they all gathered up around it, tying up the horses.  Faraday dismounted in a scrabble of hands and heels, keeping his balance as best he could with the rope still around his wrists, and let himself be led inside.

The place was dusty but in good repair.  There were tables and chairs spread out around the inside, as well as a half-open cabinet filled with blankets and bedrolls—clearly this was some kind of stopping-place.  Faraday was shoved to a seat at a table jammed into the back corner, pressed up against the wall and out of the way.  He stayed quietly, let himself fade out of the attention of the room.  The only one still eyeing him was the nervous-looking deputy, the one who’d shot Vasquez.  He was rightly concerned, it seemed, but Faraday would have to try to convince him to relax if he ever wanted to escape.

“Watch him,” the sheriff said like an afterthought, taking three of his boys with him as he moved back out.  For whatever reason, they seemed to be taking all but two of the horses along with them, probably to keep the place from looking too suspicious to anyone who might pass by.  “I’ll be back tomorrow morning, once I’ve set up the deal.  Just wait here, alright?”

The door slammed shut behind them, leaving them all staring awkwardly at each other.  In total, that left Faraday, Brady the doctor, the dead-man-walking deputy, and three others behind to entertain themselves for the night.

“Well,” Faraday said, and smiled brightly around the room.  “Anyone want to see a card trick?”

“You really think we’re just gonna untie you and let you do whatever you want?” said one man, peering suspiciously under the brim of his too-big black hat.

* * *

Half an hour later, Faraday had gotten all of them, even Brady and the still nervous-looking deputy, to gather around him as he triumphantly held up the wrong card.  “And your card appears!”

“That’s not it,” the man with the too-big hat said, shifting a little and exchanging a glance with the others.

“No?” Faraday said, narrowing his eyes as he looked over at the nine of spades, and then his watchers.  They were about primed for the good stuff.  “How about this?”  He flicked the back of the card, and the ten of diamonds appeared.  His little audience gasped.  “Or this?”  Another couple flicks, and the card was the ace of hearts, the seven of spades, the jack of clubs.

“What?” another man said quietly.  Everyone in the room had perked up, every head turning his way and every last body shifting his direction.

 _Too easy_ , he thought.  “It takes a little looking,” he said, smiling as kindly as he knew how.  “But I’ll find it.  Just you wait.”

They leaned in, and his gift shivered awake.

He sent his cards jumping from palm to palm, a little higher and faster every time, passed and cut and twisted the deck until it seemed there were too many cards, then too few.  He clapped his palms together and there was nothing there at all, shook out his sleeves and caught the two halves of the deck that slid free.  When he moved fast enough, the cards seemed to flicker between face and back, little flashes of color and shapes that appeared and disappeared.

“Watch closely,” he said, to a chorus of quiet approval.

Cards went spinning and rolling across his knuckles, over his fingertips.  One handed, he cut the deck in half once, twice, three times, each section flipping and rotating over the other before falling neatly back together, only to snap out into a fan a second later.  Each move let him shift himself in place, body and hands and deck sliding together.

“Here’s the trick,” he said, and ran through a few of the blatant cheats a little more obviously, a little more slowly, so they could see.  They leaned in closer still, let him get right up in their space and smiled while he did it.

Even dishonest men could never remember that a liar didn’t just spread his hands and freely offer up the truth.

It wasn’t about the damn cards, and it never would be, but even he wasn’t sure where skill and practice ended and his gift kicked in.  The thrills were both electric; they were the same, one maybe a bare inch more unlikely than the other, and neither impossible to notice if he didn’t carry the attention of the room like it was tied to his hands, to his cards, to wherever he wanted folks to look. 

He sent cards jumping high while his hands went low, snatching things from various pockets: a bullet here, a knife there.  A one-handed and particularly loud slapping shuffle let him unload one man’s revolver; he loaded the aces up behind his back and then snapped to make them jump to his hands, cover for when he stole the guns from the man with the too-big hat and tucked them away under his table, kicking them back to the far corner where they couldn’t be easily seen or reached.  He had an extra minute, so he pulled the firing pins out of both the third man’s pistols.  Brady, the doctor, had nothing but a knife and an unloaded gun, which was either unbelievably stupid or unbelievably bold.  He left both.  And finally, the deputy who’d shot at Vasquez—well, his guns went behind Faraday’s back, close at hand.

A little bit of pickpocketing, a little sleight-of-hand, a little misdirection, his audience pressed up on top of him and far too close to see, and he was the only one in the room with a workable weapon.  His gift trailed behind his fingers as he moved, impossible to see, unlikely as anything a man could see from a stage magician and twice as real.

“Is this your card?” he said, finally spinning up the six of hearts, holding it out with one hand and leaning forward a bit, his free hand slipping away behind him.  He’d never seen it, never marked it, but he _knew_.

The man, whose name he hadn’t learned and never would, smiled at it, his overlarge hat slipping down a little over his ears before he reached up and adjusted it again.  He still hadn’t realized that his holsters were both empty.  “Yeah, that’s it!  Six of hearts!”

Faraday let his own smile curl up at the edges, showing too many teeth.  “And is this your gun?” he said, and pulled the loaded pistol out from behind his back.

The sudden jolt of panic around the room was both gratifying and hilarious.

That first man in his stupid hat died before he had time to do more than rear back in surprise.  The second realized too late that his gun was unloaded.  He lunged forward, maybe to try to wrestle one of Faraday’s out of his hands, but Faraday kicked out his knee and got to him first.  Finally, the third man managed to fumble out a weapon, but the hammer fell apart under his hands when he tried to cock it back.  Faraday shot him while he was still staring down at it in surprise.

It took only a matter of seconds, a frantic flurry of motion that stopped all at once as he came face to face with the barrel of a pistol.  Brady held it pointed steadily straight at his head, an incredible bluff when he had to know he didn’t have a thing worth anything in his hands.  “You and I both know that’s not loaded,” Faraday said, spinning his own pistol idly.

Brady hesitated, and then shrugged, letting the useless hunk of metal drop.  “I suppose you would’ve done the same to me as them otherwise,” he said, jaw tightening a bit as he gestured with his chin at the three bodies on the floor.

Faraday fixed him with his best stare.  “If I wanted you dead, you’d be dead,” he said flatly.  “I didn’t want to kill them, either, but they weren’t about to let me walk out of here without a fight.”  Slowly, his eyes slid up and over Brady’s shoulder, fixing on the man still standing stunned behind him, pressed up against the wall and shaking.  The deputy badge on his chest was still glinting under the lamplight.  “Now, your friend there,” he said flatly, “him I do want dead.”

Brady glanced behind him, realized he was directly between Faraday and the kid, and swallowed.  When he moved, to Faraday’s surprise, it was only to firm up his stance and make sure he covered Faraday’s easiest shots.  “I can’t just let you do that.”

“I’m not against shooting through you,” Faraday told him, that original fury clawing back up, building and building.  “I’d rather not, see, but it won’t stop me.”

Brady and the deputy both flinched.  The kid opened his mouth to speak, but Faraday shot him a glare so heated his mouth snapped shut hard enough for his teeth to click together.

“He’s fine, now, your Mexican friend,” Brady said quickly, taking a step forward, so there was no way Faraday could raise the gun without physically moving him aside.  He was still rat-faced and weedy, still a man who didn’t carry a loaded weapon, but also still holding steady between the kid and certain death.  “I’ve got a power, alright.  I make the body heal itself faster.  A thing like that, a clean through-and-through?  Nothing but a scar after a couple hours.  He’s fine now.”

“You think that makes us even?” Faraday snapped back at him.  “You think it’s gone, so I can just pay it no mind?”

“No.  No.”  Brady shook his head; behind him, the young deputy shook his head at the same time, like he was on a string.  “Just hold up for a minute.  Please.  You don’t have to do this, not like this.  He’s just a kid, okay, an idiot kid, and he made an idiot mistake.  It could have been worse, yes, but it _wasn’t_ , and you’ve already drawn blood for it, so I’m asking you to let it go.  Your friend, would—would he want you to kill a man for him in cold blood?”

Faraday opened his mouth, heated, and then—hesitated.

He still remembered that hot rush of fury back in Rose Creek, when Vasquez had seen McCann shoot him in the gut.  He remembered the blinding pain in his side and the way it’d been _funny_ , the way it’d been awful, the way it hadn’t mattered at all once Vasquez came storming past.  He remembered rage and shouting, the roaring chaos of a fight, and more shots than seemed necessary to kill the man, but there had never been any doubt in it.  That was easy.  That was right.

But then there was that incident just a few days before, the slow burn of whiskey and the hotter flare of wrath, when Leo and his bastard friends had challenged them in the street.  Then there was Vasquez dragging him back and telling him to _relax,_ that it didn’t matter who’d tried to kill him because _you were there_ , easy as that, easier than breathing.  That was right, too, after a fashion.

“I don’t know,” Faraday said, horrified and fascinated, hot and cold all at once.  “I don’t know.”

Not so long ago, Vasquez had hit the floor and hadn’t come back up, and Faraday had watched the man who’d done it down the line of his pistol and felt sure, felt _right_ , because this man was dead but for the doing of it, a corpse still walking.

Now he watched a faint-hearted kid cower and sweat, and just felt tired.

“Get gone,” he said on a sigh, letting his gun drop to his side.  When Brady and the deputy both hesitated, he scowled and gestured with his free hand.  “Go,” he said, a bit of a bite to the word.  “Before I change my mind.  And if I ever see you again…”

From the way both their faces went white, he figured they didn’t need to hear how the threat ended.

* * *

That left him alone in a roomful of corpses and the iron-rust smell of blood.  He doubted there were any horses left outside, which meant he’d be walking back to town—or maybe to the meeting place, or wherever Red Harvest had gotten to, since apparently he hadn’t managed to track Faraday down.  The whole thing, from the moment Faraday had walked in the door to this moment, had taken less than an hour.

Sighing, he picked up his cards and his new guns, taking what ammo he could and filling his pockets.  “Better get started,” he told himself darkly, looking out at the setting sun, and walked out into the dusk.

He left the bodies where they lay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Have any of you heard of Apollo Robbins? He's a famous pickpocket and magician, and he is hands down the coolest thing to watch. He likes to walk up to a person, tell them he's about to rob them, and then proceed to look them straight in the eyes while he does it. The best part is that nobody actually notices. I maybe watched a little too much of him on YouTube while I was writing this chapter. Also episodes of Penn & Teller's show Fool Me. And videos about cardistry. So if you were wondering why this took longer than usual...it's because I like magic??? My bad. (If you have no idea what I'm talking about, go do a YouTube search for Apollo Robbins pickpocketing or for Shim Lin's act on Penn & Teller's Fool Me. MIND. BLOWN.)
> 
> Also: Faraday, meet clue bat to the back of the head. SORRY NOT SORRY.


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hate so much about this chapter, but it's been fighting me and I'm already late (both to post this, and to go to work, sweet baby raptor jesus). So, here. God, I hope I didn't fuck this up in any significant way, I don't have time to fix this
> 
> *dumps chapter out into the world and runs away*
> 
> (Edit: I somehow was NOT late to work. I skidded into the office and made a dive for the punch-clock EXACTLY as my scheduled shift began, despite the fact that I clearly must have broken several land-speed records and bent the laws of time and space to manage it)

It was a long way back to town.

He hadn’t realized how tired he was, or how far they’d gone, until he’d spent some hours stumbling through the midnight dark.  There was a landmark he recognized—a tree, twisted and bent, one huge limb cracked loose and drooping—and the sight of it made something drop like a stone into his belly, because it meant he was only halfway back to town.

His bad leg was a gnawing ache, already protesting hours of uncomfortable riding before he’d spent hours more stumbling over loose, sandy grit and uneven stones.  It was cold and dark, and he was caught somewhere between pissed off and reluctantly worried.  In a minute he was going to have to sit down in the middle of nowhere and just breathe for a while.

From way off, there was a sound like a horse’s scream, followed by something that sounded like the rumble of thunder.  To his right, a bright flash of lightning jumped from the ground and up into the air, completely against all the laws of nature.

“About damn time,” he muttered, relieved despite himself, and turned that direction.

Wild Jack was the first to come clear, thundering toward him and throwing up loose dirt and sand as he sped along.  His eyes rolled, wild, and a lead trailed behind him as he ran, like he’d torn loose in his hurry to run straight up at Faraday and practically bowl him over before sliding to a prancing halt.  Faraday only barely kept himself from going head over heels in the dirt, catching hold of the side of the saddle at the last moment. 

“You are the worst horse in the world,” he said, but after that Jack stood still to let him sidle up close and sling an arm over his neck to keep upright, so maybe he didn’t really mean it.  “I mean it,” he said anyway.

Jack blew out a breath at him like he was laughing, still dancing a little in place with something like nervous tension.

“Hey,” he said quietly, dragging his fingers along Jack’s side so quickly they could both pretend it was an accident.  “I’m just fine.”

Jack nudged him hard, and Faraday would have gone tumbling all over again if he still hadn’t had a good grip.  Clearly, Jack had known that, so it was probably a sign that Faraday was forgiven.

Trusting now that Jack wasn’t pissed enough to let him fall, he turned his attention toward the rest of the dusty horses and their riders headed his way.  There were six approaching, more than he’d expected, but he wasn’t so far gone that he didn’t recognize Red Harvest, Goody, and Billy in the middle of the group.  Vasquez was out front, and something kicked him in the chest at the sight of him upright and intact, his shirt clean and no blood to be seen. 

For a dizzying moment, he considered that blinding moment of clarity back in the bar, when he’d recognized the enormity of what he’d been refusing to acknowledge, and then he added the absolute relief he’d felt at just the sight of Vasquez to the proof that he wasn’t mistaken.  It wasn’t a surprise, not really, but it still made his breath catch.

Still, this was hardly the time or place.  “Took you all long enough,” he called, waving a hand in greeting, and only then realized who was missing: Horne and Chisolm were nowhere to be seen.  The other two men in the group were Deputy Abrams and a strange man Faraday didn’t know, though the deputy badge on his chest was recognizable enough.

Faraday figured he’d be forgiven if he kept an eye on that one.

He got a few shouted greetings in response.  Then there was a minute of chaos as the horses pulled to a stop around him, horses snorting and stamping and men dismounting in a jingle of buckles and spurs.  Vasquez was the first one to reach him, the first one to the ground, the first one to speak.  “ _Estás bien?_ ” he demanded, looking at him too fiercely, too sharply, scowling as he noticed just how much Faraday was relying on Jack to keep upright.  “You’re not hurt?”

It took a second to understand the question, and once he did it was easy enough to wave it off.  “What?  I’m fine.”  Something like nerves fluttered in his belly, made his hands feel cold and clammy, and it was hard to look anywhere near Vasquez’s face.  But it was equally hard to look away, because the terror from before was still there, despite what he’d seen with his own two eyes and despite what he’d learned about Brady’s gift.  Denial only worked so far.  He wanted to reach out, he wanted to be _sure_ , but Vasquez was staying a good arm’s length back and hadn’t so much as prodded at Faraday with his mind-gift.  It made something hot and sharp turn over under Faraday’s breastbone, to realize he might not be welcome.

Well.  It wasn’t like he didn’t deserve it, after all, since it was his own damn fault the man had gotten hurt in the first place.

“You’re the one who got shot,” he said roughly, pushing through it.  A visual check was going to have to be enough.  “Brady, that doctor, he said he fixed it, he had some gift, but—you alright?”

Vasquez’s face went strange, doing something Faraday didn’t know to read.  It was strange to look him in the eyes and not have that steady background hum of every feeling passing through his head.  “It’s all but gone now,” he said, a little softer, but not by much.  He rolled his shoulder thoughtfully, and Faraday saw the ease of motion and relaxed a little himself. 

Red Harvest pushed through the group, looking Faraday up and down just once before nodding.  “Good to see you.”

“You, too.  What kept you?” he said, genuinely curious rather than upset.  He hadn’t expected them to be right on his heels, but he had expected them all to catch up much quicker.  Instead, they’d been much farther off and somehow gathered up a crowd.  “Run into some problems?”

“A few.”  Red shrugged.

“After we sat around and did nothing,” Vasquez muttered.  Faraday raised an eyebrow at him, but he mostly ignored it in favor of glowering over at Red.

Red Harvest, though, seemed unconcerned.  “I made him wait until the bleeding stopped,” he said.  Honestly, Faraday would probably have done the same, so he shrugged and let it go.  Vasquez still looked pissed off.

“And then they ran straight into us,” Goody cut in.  “Gave us a hand in shaking off a bit of trouble on our tails.”  He hadn’t unhooked his rifle from his saddle, but he was keeping a hand on it and doing a decent enough job of pretending it was casual.  Still, he was steady enough, and Billy wasn’t even side-eyeing him for once, so Faraday figured it hadn’t been that much of a problem.  “Those damn bandits were ready and waiting for us.”

“They’re not bandits, first off,” Faraday told them, and scowled at the thought.  “Vasquez had the right of it: they’re flesh-traders.”  Vasquez cursed darkly, not especially pleased to have figured it out first, and Faraday let his gaze flicker that way for just a second before darting away.  The others didn’t react much better.  “And the sheriff’s been working with them for years.  He told them you all were coming.”

Deputy Abrams scowled; every buckle, loose strap, and cloth piece near him quivered for a second as his gift reacted to his anger.  “I’d heard from your friends that he wasn’t what we thought,” he said, “but I never believed he’d go and shoot us all in the back like that.”

Faraday quickly ran through the rest of what the sheriff had passed along, from the disaster with his son to the reason Faraday himself had been taken both times over, as well as what little the man had passed along of his plans.

“Halleck split his group and headed off back to meet up with the Mexicans,” he finished.  “I…waited for a good time and took the chance to get the heck out of dodge.”  He shrugged at the looks that got him.  “Figured I might as well start walking back to town, and here we are.”  He looked around the group one more time, like Chisolm and Horne might just appear.  “Well, excepting Sam and Jack, anyway.  What happened to you all?”

Billy ran a finger along the edges of his knives like he was imagining using them.  “It was an ambush,” he said.

“Your Seer friend didn’t get an idea of it until it was too late,” Abrams said.  “Us few here barely managed to get out, and the rest weren’t so lucky.”

Goody frowned, going mild in that lazy way that meant he was getting ready to strike out.  “Well, if it wasn’t for him and Sam causing a distraction and giving us a chance to escape, we’d all be in the same boat,” he pointed out.  “And it’s your own sheriff who sold us out in the first place.”

Abrams raised his hands, nonthreatening.  The other deputy looked cowed.  “Now, that’s not what I meant by it,” he said.  “I’m not trying to pass blame.”

Goody eyed him for a minute, and then turned back to Faraday.  “We got split up,” he said.  He didn’t sound particularly happy about it.  “Not sure what happened to them after that, but if these folks are people-snatchers, chances are they’re fine for now even if they did get themselves caught.  Now the rest of us, we got chased halfway back to town before Red and Vasquez here heard the scuffle and came over to lend a hand.  After that we figured the best thing to do was come and get you.”

Faraday looked them all over, but they all seemed mostly intact, not even a scrape or a scuff to show for the whole escape.  He’d almost be relieved, but without Chisolm or Horne it was still hard to relax all the way.  The two could take care of themselves, certainly, but a gang of riled-up slavers was unusual even for them.  “Well, I appreciate it,” he said, especially since somebody’d seen fit to wrangle Jack along so he’d have a way to move with them.  “We got a plan?”

“Stick out the night somewhere and go back in early tomorrow,” Goody said promptly.  “Find all our boys and get them out.  They shouldn’t expect us back so soon.”

Faraday raised an eyebrow at him.  “And you all complain about some of _my_ ideas.”

Very, very briefly, so quick he almost missed it, Faraday caught the flickering edge of Vasquez’s smile.  “Don’t tell me you don’t like it,” Vasquez said.  “You’re the one who suggests we always shoot a problem in the face.”

Faraday had to admit that was true.

Goody rolled his eyes at both of them

“I might know of a good spot to stay the night,” Deputy Abrams said thoughtfully, ignoring their little back-and-forth.  “There’s a stopping place, not too far out, more a cabin than anything else.  We’ve used it as a spot for storage, or for when folks want to go and hunt farther out of town.”

Faraday narrowed his eyes.  “It’s not that place a good few miles back that ways, is it?” he said, gesturing back the way he’d come.

“No, no, it’s up another few miles out there,” Abrams said, and waved off in an entirely new direction, closer to the camp up in the hills.  “I know the one you mean, though.”  He paused, and he wasn’t the only one giving Faraday a strange look.  “Why’d you ask, son?”

Faraday considered, and decided he didn’t much want to answer truthfully with officers of the law present.  “No particular reason.”

Goody ran a hand over his face with a sigh, but when he spoke, it sounded more like he was trying not to laugh.  “I feel this might be one of those questions where we don’t rightly want to know the answer,” he said.

“And now isn’t the time,” Billy cut in, speaking for the first time.  He was eyeing the horizon with an intensity that made Faraday nervous, but he quickly cut his gaze back to the group.  “Let’s not stand around in the open.”

* * *

They made the trip mostly in silence, once they’d all mounted back up and headed off.  Vasquez had let him crawl his way up onto Jack without a word, but he had narrowed his eyes and brushed his palm against the side of Faraday’s leg once he was settled.  Faraday wasn’t sure if the shiver that ran through him was from the touch or the way the ache had drained out of him all at once.

* * *

It was late, and they were all tired enough to fall asleep standing up, by the time they got where they were going.

The cabin was bigger than the shack where Halleck and his men had taken Faraday, with four rooms in each corner cut through by a narrow central hallway.  Faraday’s five claimed one room, and the two deputies took another; the whole place was dusty and disused, but those two rooms were at least somewhat livable.  The other two rooms they used for the horses, dragging in armfuls of dried shrub that was safe to use as feed, filling dented metal pails with whatever water they could scavenge, before ducking back into their separate spaces.  Without the other two listening in, it was easier for them to go back over everything that had happened without worrying about watching their words and waiting for the double-cross.  Faraday got the idea that they’d all be sleeping with guns in hand, at least until they got everything sorted and figured out who knew what.

It was dark, but they’d found a couple of lamps with oil that hadn’t quite dried up, and settled themselves around the light like it was a real fire and not the closest they could get while inside.

“You had us worried,” Vasquez said when they’d mostly gone quiet.

Faraday laughed, offering a smile that Vasquez only barely returned.  “Pretty sure you boys had the worst of it,” he pointed out, because at least he hadn’t been shot, at least he hadn’t had to fight off an ambush and outrun a manhunt in the flatlands.  At least, unlike Chisolm and Horne, he’d managed to find his way back.  “Mine was hardly a fight.”

It really hadn’t been.  From the moment they’d left his mouth uncovered and his cards in his pocket, he’d known there wasn’t much he wouldn’t be able to handle.

“Well, that is true, but at least we had our guns and some backup ready to hand.  Red told us you up and let the man hogtie you and drag you out,” Goody said, exasperated.  “You didn’t think that’d be a concern for anyone?”

Faraday frowned.  “Not really,” he said.  Billy shook his head, and Vasquez made a furious sound, but when Faraday looked over at Red Harvest he found the man looking just as confused.  “I had things under control.”

“ _Under control_ ,” Vasquez repeated quietly, like he didn’t quite believe the words.

“You had no weapons, your hands were tied together, and more than half a dozen men were dragging you off to an unknown fate.”  Goody looked like he sincerely wished Chisolm was there to take back responsibility for their little band.  “Isn’t that worth some measure of concern?  It’s a hell of a gamble to make with your own life just for a little information.”

“That’s what I do, damn it all,” Faraday snapped, exasperated, and threw up his hands.  They didn’t have to believe him, but he was still decently sure he’d never really been in danger at all.  “What, do you think I have some kind of death wish?”

There was an uncomfortable sort of pause, where Faraday figured for the first time that was exactly what they thought.  At least Vasquez had only accused him of doubt and mistrust, not suicidal tendencies.

“Well,” Goody said at last.

“Oh, sweet son of a—” Faraday growled, gesturing wildly with one hand while he dug out his deck of cards with the other.  There was an easy enough way to solve this whole debate, and truth be told he wasn’t entirely sure why he hadn’t done it sooner.  He shuffled quickly, and then fanned the cards out with a snap.  “Look, just pick a card.”

“Is now really the time for a magic trick?” Goody asked, raising an eyebrow.

“For the love of all that is holy, Goodnight Robicheaux, I am trying to explain this thing as best I can,” Faraday bit out, dark and intent.  “So _pick a goddamn card_.”

Goody picked a goddamn card.

It was the two of clubs, because of course it was: Goodnight Robicheaux had never touched a card in this deck except for the ones Faraday had picked to represent Billy and him, so of course one of the two was bound to leap to his hand.  Faraday went around the circle, making sure everybody had free and fair choice of their own cards, and each turned up nothing surprising.  Billy pulled the two of hearts.  Red Harvest pulled his nine of diamonds, and a flicker of a smile pulled up the corner of his mouth as he looked from it to Faraday and then back.  He, at least, might have the faintest idea what to expect.

Vasquez, still quiet and distant, nevertheless edged forward to pull the ace of clubs.  He was a little too careful not to let their hands brush against each other, and Faraday shoved away the hurt that wanted to slice through him.  He’d fix that later, once this whole mess was done, provided it was even a thing that could be fixed.

“Hold onto those,” he said firmly, and made a sharp hissing noise when it looked like Goody might be considering opening his mouth to speak.  “Give me a minute, Goodnight, and watch close.”

The first part was easy, was nothing he hadn’t done before.  His cards moved over his hands, with his hands, until they were a part of them and a part of him, and then he felt his gift ignite like a spark catching hold.

“Look,” he told them, no misdirection for once, just open hands and a deck he’d never needed to rig.  When he shook the cards, the jack of spades leapt to the top, face-up: his still-lucky one-eyed jack, a replacement for the one that’d been destroyed way back when with the dynamite and the Gatling gun.  His card and his gift hadn’t exactly kept him alive, back in Rose Creek, but then again they hadn’t exactly let him die, either.  Maybe somehow that was even better, because he’d gambled, he’d lost it all, and still somehow he’d come out on top.  That sort of thing stuck with a man.

“Do you boys believe in luck?” he asked, looking from one face to the next and meeting with mostly confusion.  “Don’t you have any of those tricky little superstitions?  I do.  There’s not much to back them up, but I guess mostly that’s the point.  The difference is that mine mostly come true.”

This time, Red Harvest nudged Goody hard in the side when it looked like the man might speak up again.  Faraday shot him a grin.

“I can’t read minds,” he said with a quick, darting look over at Vasquez, over an arm’s length away and not looking as bothered by the distance as Faraday felt.  He shook himself and moved on.  “I can’t summon up lightning, or see the future, or even see into the distance.  I can’t dodge death.”  He raised an eyebrow at Billy, whose chin dipped slightly in acknowledgement.  “I’m not nearly so flashy as all that.”

On the last word, he sent the cards shooting up, a fluttering arch that shouldn’t have landed so neatly back in his hands.

“Flashy,” Vasquez said flatly, and nothing more.  Faraday wanted to drag him in, to shake him until the stiffness fell out and his Vasquez—warm, soft, smiling—came back.  Christ, he’d messed this whole thing up.

Focus.  He swallowed hard and then nodded, making sure his smile looked more real than it felt.  It seemed like maybe Vasquez was getting with the program, though Goody still looked a strange combination of confused and curious and Billy looked as flat as ever.  Red looked a bit like he knew what to expect, though Faraday could hardly guess what he’d figured out over time.

“Right, that’s not me.”  He put on his best innocent grin.

The others watched him, waiting for the trick, except this time the trick was that there was no trick at all, no sleight-of-hand or flashy moves to hide what he was really doing.  There was no reveal, nothing up his sleeve.  There was nothing at all to see, because in the end the one thing he knew for certain was that whatever it was shivering along his spine, cupped between his palms, trapped behind his tongue—that was his, and his alone.

The cards stayed still, unassuming.  “Me, I run on luck and a prayer,” he said, and ran the edge of his nail down the side of the deck, catching on each and every card with a quick movement and quiet rattle of sound.  Everyone shivered, all at once, so faintly he’d bet they hadn’t noticed.  “It’s easy to miss.”

He did it again, slower and drawn out, and this time they all clearly felt the brush of whatever-it-was.  Red Harvest stared him down, clearly expecting something of the sort; everyone else looked around, glancing between each other like they needed the reassurance that they weren’t the only one sensing something strange.  Only Vasquez even bothered to glance at his own card, but then again he’d been the only one to feel _something_ when Faraday had tried his little protection-trick before.

“You alright?” he said, all mock-concern, pausing with his nail only partway down the deck.  “Seems like somebody walked across your graves.”

“Faraday,” Goody started, and Faraday cut him off by letting the rest of the deck slap down with a sharpness they clearly all felt as it echoed across from card to card.  They jumped, even Billy, even Red Harvest, and Faraday caught the faintest edge of surprise from Vasquez before the man hurriedly reeled his own power back under control.

 “It’s not about the cards,” he said, just to clarify, though when he twitched his fingertips he felt the cards strain outwards against the hands still holding them tight, just hard enough for them all to notice the pull.  A bit of belief—superstition, really, founded on nothing but a wish and a will—and he knew they’d dance, good luck and bad luck, possible and impossible, winning and losing spinning together like spokes on either side of a wagon wheel.  And then there was Faraday, dancing alongside them, between them, sliding between the two as easy as sliding a card up his sleeve.  “It’s just most folks can’t see what they don’t expect to see.”

These little twitches and jolts were all they could feel, all they could sense, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t there.

He gathered it up, that fluttering whatever-it-was, always tilting between real and not-real, and he pressed it down hard between his palms the same way he pressed down hard on the deck.  Static, pointless, it held there and trembled between him and them and the cards binding them together like threads.  Nobody moved, nobody spoke, but there was no way they couldn’t feel it.  There was no way, now, that they didn’t _know_.

And then he reeled his power in, and in, until it was nothing.  Already, he could see the others shaking themselves awake, the memory of his power fading into the everyday, until he was nothing more than a gambler, nothing more than a drunk Irishman with a deck of cards.

There was a long, painful pause.

It was hard not to focus on the way Vasquez just kept staring at him, caught like a compass needle pulling north.  He didn’t look away, not even when Faraday darted little glances his direction.  Without the prickling of his mind-gift, it was impossible to tell what he might be thinking.  Faraday broke first, and looked away, hands clenching against his will before he could make them relax.

Luckily, someone broke the tense standoff before he had to.  “You have a power,” Billy said quietly.

That seemed to relax everyone enough that they moved, all four of them letting out a deep breath as one.  It was almost funny.

“You have a _power_ ,” Goody repeated, stunned, holding his two of clubs between his finger and thumb like he was concerned the thing might catch fire if he didn’t pay close enough attention.  “Christ, Faraday, you might have told us you were gifted before now.”

Faraday shrugged, and then grinned.  “Never said I wasn’t,” he pointed out.  “I can’t help what you all believe.”

 _A bit of this and that_ , he’d told Chisolm.  _Harmless,_ he’d said to Goody and Billy.  Even Red Harvest had never asked for specifics, and he’d never seen the point in bringing it up.  It wasn’t like it was useful all that often, or at least not deliberately.

“I’m never playing cards with you again,” Billy said decisively.

* * *

There were questions, most of which he couldn’t answer.

“Look,” he said, once Goody had mostly exhausted himself with a lot of pointless demands for explanations he didn’t have and details he couldn’t give.  Billy and Red Harvest were mostly just listening quietly, and Vasquez had stuck to his disturbing silence.  “My gift isn’t good for much of anything solid.  Just trust me when I say I know what I’m doing, alright?  Chances are I’ll dodge and bluff my way out of most anything I come across.  I don’t throw myself into danger for a cheap thrill.”

A death wish, honestly—it wasn’t that he wanted to die, not in the slightest.  It was only that he was still, always, a gambler.  He wanted to know if he could _win_.

* * *

“Keep the cards close,” he told them, plucking Billy’s out of his hand and passing it over to Goodnight instead to hold.  They exchanged a quick glance, bemused, but didn’t ask.  “You never know when you might need them.”

“To do what, exactly?” Goody said, still holding the cards out and away from himself.

Faraday shrugged.  “What’s needed,” he said.  “Protection, hopefully.”

Red Harvest was already tucking his away, perfectly happy with the situation as he saw it.  “They’re talismans,” he said, patting his pocket firmly to make sure the thin slip of paper would stay in place.  “It isn’t the first time he’s used them.”

Billy looked surprised again.  “Really?” he said.  “When else?”

Faraday opened his mouth, but Vasquez spoke up before he could.  “Rose Creek,” he said, running a thumb thoughtfully over the front of the card like he was testing the feel of it, the weight.  “Isn’t that right?”

He looked up, and his eyes caught with Faraday’s, dark and heavy and sure.  Faraday went speechless for a minute, nodding until his tongue caught back up again.  “Yeah,” he croaked, and then coughed to clear his throat.  “It’s not perfect, but it might tip the scales in your favor.”

And then he made his excuses, claiming he needed to sleep, and took the chance to get the heck out of dodge before he did something more idiotic than usual in front of everyone else.

* * *

Early the next morning, Faraday woke and found his leg was still a grinding, screaming pain.  He clenched his teeth around a pained hiss, and dragged himself up off the floor, seating himself on the bare table against the wall so he could dig his fingers into the muscle and try to loosen it up again. 

Most of the room was empty, everyone already awake and apparently gone outside.  Goody, the only other person there, cleaned his rifle and watched him quietly.  “You’ll be okay to walk and ride on that?” he said, almost a question.

“Sure,” Faraday said, after a second where he caught his breath.  “Just give me a minute.”

Goody did him the favor of pretending he believed it.

“Where’s everyone else?” he said, needing something to distract him.  As long as he held mostly still, his leg felt fine, except for the rush of pins and needles that meant cramped muscles were beginning to wake and stretch.

Goody shrugged at him.  “Billy wanted to go over the lay of the land a bit more with Abrams,” he said.  “Something about wanting to see if he could figure the ambush points with his gift before having to actively dodge bullets.  Anything you could help with?”  The last bit came out hopefully, like he was just realizing something.

Faraday shrugged.  “Maybe, maybe not,” he said, because he honestly had never tried or even considered the idea.  It didn’t sound totally impossible.  “Billy’s probably better for it, anyway.”

“Fair enough.  Anyway, the others went and tagged along.  Figured I’d stay here and keep watch.”

Faraday heard what he wasn’t saying: they’d let him get some more sleep.  “Thanks,” he muttered after a grudging second, but Goody took it at face value and just hummed quiet acceptance.

All in all, it wasn’t too bad a morning before a fight, if it wasn’t for the fact that Faraday knew for a fact that any other day it’d be Vasquez in here with him and Goody outside with Billy, pairs as established as anything after all their time as a group.  The thought that he’d been associating him and Vasquez with the close-knit couple that was Goody and Billy, all without realizing, made him twitch a little.

He really, really needed to fix this.

Like somebody’d heard the thought, the door opened and Vasquez came through.  Faraday’s heart kicked him in the chest and dropped into his stomach at the same time.  He hadn’t meant _right this second_.  Maybe he’d bring it up later, in a few days, when he could figure out what to do with the knotted mess curling up in his throat.  That’d give him a chance to decide just how angry Vasquez was with him, and if he—whether he even wanted whatever this was, anyway.  He didn’t even know how to go about phrasing it.

“We’re ready to go,” Vasquez said, his eyes sliding evenly across Faraday at his place on the table and carrying straight on to Goody without even a pause.  “They sent me to check in.  Everything good?”

“Sure,” Goody said cheerfully, picking up on the tension in the room and doing a passable attempt at ignoring it.  “As soon as Faraday here can use that leg of his again, we’ll head out.”

“Damn it, Goody,” Faraday said, scowling.

But Vasquez, all the way across the room, paused with his hand hovering over the doorknob.  “You’re hurt?” he said, seeming to notice the odd way Faraday was sitting all at once.

“I’m _fine_ ,” Faraday said, exasperated, and realized a second too late that was probably the wrong thing to say.

Vasquez snorted.

“I am,” he insisted.  “Look, I don’t know what you’re expecting from me, V.  It’s just my damn leg, same as ever.  What’s the problem here?”

“The problem is that every time I leave you alone for ten minutes, you do this,” Vasquez said, practically a growl, and threw up his hands.  His body was angled away from Faraday, enough that when he looked straight ahead, it put his gaze off to the side and nowhere near Faraday’s face.  “Can’t you keep out of trouble for once?”

That burned.  Faraday refused to let his face heat, because it wasn’t like he was some dog running around terrorizing the sheep.  “What’s that supposed to mean?” he snapped.  It seemed like he couldn’t talk to the man anymore without it turning to a fight, and he hated it.

“I mean,” Vasquez said, clear and precise, “your gift won’t save you from everything.  You’re not unbreakable, you understand that?  I mean that I am _angry_.”

He hated it, but it wasn’t going to stop him.  “Who’s the one who got shot earlier, huh?” Faraday said, sputtering with rage.  “I know that’s my fault, and I’m sorry for that, but I thought you were _dead_ , you complete—and now you won’t even look at me—”  He made a couple of violent gestures, unwilling and unable to explain just what he meant.

That caught Vasquez’s attention.  He looked up, eyes blazing.  “ _Pinche idiota_ , that wasn’t your fault.  Why would I be— _no seas estúpido.  Eso no tiene sentido_.  I’m angry that you won’t be more careful!  You _have actually died_ ,” he snapped, and it made whatever argument Faraday was building wither in his chest.  “I was the first one there, did you know that?  I saw your body.  _No me digas lo que ya sé._ ”  The words punched out of him, furious and intent.  “And if you want to talk about looks, _cabrón_ , you think I don’t notice you staring at me?”

Damn.

“You want to talk about this now?” Faraday asked, caught between hysteria and disbelief as he gestured around the room, the situation as a whole, heart kicking up speed in his chest.  “ _Now?_ Really?”

“Might as well.”  Vasquez stared him down, his voice dropping until it was low and intense.  “Nowhere to run off to this time.”

A throat cleared; they both looked up and remembered at the same instant that Goodnight Robicheaux was still in the room, eyes wide and rifle cradled a bit too protectively in front of him.  “Oh, don’t mind me,” he said, schooling his expression and strolling a bit too quick to be casual across the room toward the exit.  “Seems you boys have a thing or two to discuss.  I’ll be in the hallway, er, outside maybe, minding the perimeter or some such.  I’ll let the others know not to come barging in.”

He skedaddled.  By the time he’d finished speaking, his voice was trailing down the hallway behind him, and the door clicked shut.

Faraday felt a flush crawling across his face and down the line of his throat.  He stared up off into the corner of the ceiling and tried desperately to pretend that he couldn’t feel Vasquez’s stare boring holes into the side of his head.  The intensity of a minute before was gone; now he just felt intensely uncomfortable with the situation, and surely Vasquez did too.  He’d managed to mess the whole thing up, hadn’t he?  Even if Vasquez was insisting he wasn’t angry about Faraday getting him shot, Christ, the man had barely spoken to him, let alone made any sign that he wanted Faraday’s company—

“ _Guero_ ,” Vasquez said finally, probably picking up on the panic, and that was all.

It was enough.  Faraday didn’t know he’d missed it until he was already heaving in a breath, his lungs and chest going lax with relief.  If he felt this much just at the man’s voice, at that stupid nickname, what else was he missing out on?  “Yeah.”

“Look at me.”

Faraday did, stubborn pride crawling up his spine—he could do this.  Vasquez looked impassive, blank as anything, but hell, Faraday’s whole life had been an exercise in learning to read a poker face, hadn’t it?  And he’d spent years jumping off cliffs and hoping there was something at the bottom to break his fall.  He played life like a high-stakes game, big risks for big rewards, laughing at danger, laughing at the odds.  It was a thing to _win_ , so he covered up his weak spots and fronted for all he was worth.  His power, his self, revolved around it— _look at my hands, don’t look at my_ —

Except Vasquez wasn’t him.  Vasquez carried everything right out front, touched minds and shared thoughts as easy as a clasp on the arm, a friendly nudge on the shoulder.  There was nothing to win or lose here, not really, because while he’d been holding up his cards and trying to bluff his way through, Vasquez hadn’t been playing a game at all.  Or if he was, he’d been holding out his hand and letting Faraday look over his shoulder all the while, so it barely even counted.

So—well, so.  This wasn’t a time to keep running from the conversation.  He made a conscious effort to relax, one muscle at a time, and to think this thing through, rather than skittering away from it like he’d been doing before, damned coward that he was.

He thought he knew.  He wasn’t an idiot, and Vasquez had basically been waving it in his face this whole time, if he’d only bothered to listen.

But because he was still yellow, at least when it came to this, he wouldn’t—couldn’t—just make the leap.  He had to ask.  “Here’s the thing,” he said, slow and intent and serious, like he hadn’t been before.  “I know I’ve been—I’ve been all-fired stupid about this whole thing.  But I need you to tell me what you want from me.”

Vasquez looked back at him, still so blank and unmoving.  “ _Nada,_ ” he said a little too quickly.  “Nothing.”

“Now, see,” Faraday said, a mite testy, as his stomach clenched tight.  “That’s just not true.”

Vasquez shifted on his feet.  Was it really that he was hard to read?  Faraday wondered if maybe it was just that he’d gotten so used to the man broadcasting his every feeling everywhere that he hadn’t bothered to look.  Whyever it was, he was standing too far off and keeping himself too far back, like he hadn’t even when they’d only just met, snapping and snarling at one another like wild dogs and still closer than these ten damn feet Vasquez was keeping between them at all times.

It pissed him off.  He’d never admit it, but it frightened him a little, too.  _No risk, no reward_ , he told himself, and gritted his teeth.

“No lie, _guero_ —Faraday,” Vasquez said at last, and took a slow step back.  He was back to avoiding Faraday’s eyes, and Faraday took a sharp breath in, rocked forward a little in his seat to give him a piece of his mind.  Before he could open his mouth, Vasquez spoke up again.  “I know that you don’t—”  He stopped himself, and waved a hand at his head in that little wobbling gesture that Faraday associated with his gift.  “You don’t have to worry.  I won’t—”

He cut himself off again, cursed, and mumbled something that Faraday didn’t have a hope of understanding. 

Finally, finally, he turned and looked Faraday back in the eye.  “I want you,” he said, raising his hands in a full-body shrug, something like defeat across his face.  It hit Faraday like a punch to the gut.  “But—I want _nothing_ that you do not choose to give me.”

Faraday stared, wide-eyed, feeling like he’d been shot.  It’d happened before, so he ought to know the feeling.  He was—and he thought—

All this time, he’d assumed Vasquez had known his thoughts exactly.  He’d assumed Vasquez had seen his bluff, and hadn’t wanted to call it out; all the while, Vasquez had seen what he’d assumed to be the truth, and let himself fold.

 _Nothing that you don’t choose to give me_ , like he thought Faraday didn’t want a thing at all, instead of being too damn stubborn to admit it even to himself, and then too afraid to ask.  Like he didn’t know Faraday’s heart had just about stopped in his chest when Vasquez had hit the floor and failed to get back up.

There was a mistake somewhere in that line of reasoning, so staggering that his mind just went blank with shock and his mouth just—moved, entirely without his permission.  It still took a second to remember how to work his lungs.  “In that case,” he said, leaning forward from his perch on the table, “ _what in the hell are you doing all the way over there_?”

Vasquez started.  “What?” he said.  Faintly, Faraday felt his gift brush up against his mind, the faintest prickling edge of a thought, all caution-confusion- _faint_ - _hope_ and the first time Vasquez had reached out the whole damn day.  He hated it.  In response, Faraday sucked in a breath, bundled up everything he could, and shoved it in his direction.

Friendship and something more, tangled up in confusion and pride and a hint of dread.  There was that heart-stopping horror, from the minute he’d believed Vasquez was dead.  Relief, strong enough to make his hands shake and rattle him to the core, when he’d learned otherwise.  Then there was the hurt, stubborn and unshakeable, from when Vasquez had backed off.  And through all that, something warm and soft, sweet and reluctant, affection and attraction and something else buried deep and so well-guarded he’d been able to pretend it hadn’t been there at all.  But it was, it _was_ , though it felt a little like Faraday was clawing open his own ribcage and showing off his internal organs to let anyone see it.

Vasquez sucked in a heavy breath.  Faraday looked away, back at that corner of the ceiling, his refusal to feel shame about any of this warring with his pride in his chest.  “So,” he said, forcing his voice steady.  “There’s that.”

“Oh,” Vasquez said.  This time, Vasquez’s mind-touch was anything but tentative, a wave of something shocked and glad rushing over him, just goddamn thrilled, all for something so simple that his throat knotted up and tried to choke him.  He hadn’t known he’d miss Vasquez’s thoughts against his own until they were gone.  “Oh, _guerito_.  Don’t be embarrassed.”

Faraday scowled, flushing all over again, but this time Vasquez only laughed at him.  He couldn’t even feel hurt about it, because it wasn’t meant to be mean, because everything was fine, because that bright spot tucked in under Faraday’s breastbone was there in Vasquez, too, warm and smooth as silk, familiar and terrifying and _good_.  He didn’t have to name it to know what it was.

“Damn it, you’re _still over there_ ,” he snapped, only half-joking.  Vasquez moved before he even had to reach out, before he had a chance to curse his damn leg, darting across that stupid, too-careful space in just a few quick steps.

He stopped himself just shy of Faraday’s space, and then leaned in slowly, giving him plenty of time to back away if he chose.  Faraday didn’t, and so his hands came up to frame Faraday’s jaw.  “Yes?” he asked, smiling like he already knew the answer, standing loose and easy.

Faraday let his own hands drift up, hooking two fingers through Vasquez’s belt loops and tugging him forward another step, leaning back himself until Vasquez was standing in the cradle of his legs.  He let go of the belt and slid his hands down, just a few inches, biting back a laugh when Vasquez’s eyes darkened.  “Yeah,” he said, and didn’t bother to hide that stupid fondness rushing through him, felt it get mirrored right back.  “Yeah.”

Vasquez leaned down.  Faraday pressed up, and they met in the middle.

Kissing him was—good.  Better than good, all heat and wet and pressure and a hint of teeth—god _damn_ , the man could kiss, so Faraday figured it wasn’t his fault if it knocked all the words better than _good_ straight out of his head.  There was a burst of heat twisting through Faraday’s belly, catching in his chest, and he wondered with a dizzy sort of distance if Vasquez could feel that, too.  Maybe he could.  Maybe he could feel the buzzing all the way down to his fingertips, the bright-hot _rightness_ of it all, like he’d been in the dark for a lifetime and finally stepped out into the sun.

He bit at Vasquez’s lower lip and leaned back, needing a breath, but Vasquez just carried right on, nipping little bites and kisses down the line of Faraday’s jaw, down his neck.  He swore, his hands mindlessly clenching tight and loosening again around Vasquez’s thighs, and that got him a muffled noise as Vasquez shoved forward until his knee was braced up on the table between Faraday’s legs.  His own hands slid down Faraday’s neck, down over his shoulders, down the line of his chest, before he planted them on either side of Faraday’s hips, bracketing him in.

Not that Faraday minded, because it put Vasquez back at the perfect height to kiss him again.

And again.

It went on like that for a good long while.  Faraday let his mind turn off after a bit, because he had better things to be doing than thinking, like figuring out what would happen if he tangled his fingers in Vasquez’s hair and _pulled_.  The results, he decided, were pretty damn satisfying.

Eventually Vasquez pulled back, clearly reluctant—both of them were flushed and breathless.  Vasquez was bright-eyed and grinning, broadcasting such obvious affection that Faraday had to groan and duck down, clutching at Vasquez’s shirt with one hand as he pressed his forehead against his collarbone.  Vasquez let it happen, curled an arm around his back and just kept on projecting the twin to that huge and nameless thing that had taken up residence in Faraday’s ribcage.

“Come on, _querido_ ,” Vasquez murmured after a minute.  “It’s about time to go.”  He didn’t move.

Faraday didn’t either, though the thought of somebody stumbling in on them like this was a distant mortification he didn’t want to address.  A little bit of cold crept through the tangle of warmth in his chest at the thought of what they were about to do—nothing they hadn’t done before, but then Faraday hadn’t known what he might be missing.  “Hey,” he said quietly, through the lump in his throat.  “Don’t die on me.”

Vasquez sighed.  “Or you,” he said just as quietly.  “Not again.”

Right—for him, it wouldn’t be the first time.  Faraday leaned back, enough so they could look each other in the eyes, though not so far that either had to let go just yet.  “You got your card?”

“Yes, yes,” Vasquez said, rolling his eyes a little, like they both weren’t equally aware of the black ace already tucked away safely in his shirt pocket.  Even if they weren’t—this, Vasquez wasn’t going to leave behind any bit of protection he could get his hands on.

“I—”  Faraday swallowed hard, and tried again.  “Just so we’re clear this time, I am—awful fond of you.”  He pried his chest open again, dragging out his thoughts just enough to make certain Vasquez could feel that bright-hard thing pressing up against his breastbone.

Vasquez offered it back, easy as anything, like it didn’t cost him a thing to put his heart in his hands and hold it out.  “ _Sí, lo sé_ ,” Vasquez said, still with that obvious affection pouring off him, plus a hint of wry amusement.  “Same here.”  He smiled.

Faraday let himself smile back, relaxing almost against his will.  This was _Vasquez_.  It was safe.

A sudden pounding on the door made them both jump.  “It’s awful quiet in there,” Goody hollered through the thin wood.  “You boys better be decent!  Come on out!”

“Better quiet than the unholy racket you and Billy were making night before last!” Faraday hollered back before he could think better of it.  “So hold your damn horses!”

Goody burst into some very colorful curses, quickly moving away as he backed off down the hallway.  They both snickered, smug amusement swimming lazily through the air.

Finally, Vasquez stepped back.  Faraday’s hands, still tangled up in his shirt, slid free and dropped back to his sides, and he sighed, finally pushing himself forward so he could drag himself to his feet.  His bum leg protested, but Vasquez reached out to brush his open palm against the side of Faraday’s face, pushing the pain away until his leg decided it would hold.  “Okay?” Vasquez asked, his face so damn open.

Faraday wasn’t sure what his own face was doing.  “So far, so good,” he said, with a smile that hurt.

It seemed that was the wrong answer, because Vasquez twisted his eyes shut, sucked in a breath.  His mind-touched pulled back a little.

“Hey,” Faraday said gently, and his hand drifted to his pocket so he could slide a fingernail across the edges of his deck.  Vasquez jolted like he’d been shocked, his own hand flying up to press against the card hidden in his shirt, over his heart.  Wide-eyed, he stared up at Faraday, who let his grin go sharp-edged, a little bit feral.  “Trust me, I’ve got this.  What’s the worst that could happen?”

Vasquez’s mind-touch came edging back, with a little of that sizzling rush that he only got before a good fight.  “We fail, and all die a horrible death.”

“Eh,” Faraday said, taking a step toward the door.  Vasquez slid to the side, turned and moved with him, so their shoulders bumped together as they walked.  “Don’t be so damn pessimistic.  Maybe we’ll get lucky.”

That got him a laugh.  “Well, if luck is with anyone, _guero_ ,” Vasquez said, smiling again, “it’s with you.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WILL ADD SPANISH TRANSLATIONS AND MORE NOTES LATER. OH GOD I AM RUNNING SO LATE BUT AT LEAST THIS IS DONE
> 
> *Edit!!*
> 
> Okay, let's try this again, lol. We finally found some emotional gratification under this steaming pile of miscommunication and stubborn stupidity! I'm so proud of these boys for finally using their words. Except not. Because they used the bare minimum words required to get their points across. Also, as I've been telling everyone in the comments:
> 
> Faraday: *is emotionally stunted gummi bear*  
> Vasquez: "I love gummi bears"  
> Faraday: *blushes*
> 
> TRANSLATIONS  
> Estás bien: Are you okay?  
> No seas estúpido. Eso no tiene sentido: Don't be stupid. That makes no sense  
> No me digas lo que ya sé: Don't tell me what I already know  
> Nada: nothing  
> Querido: sweetheart


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> First of all: to the lovely and wonderful MistMarauder, I want to say THANK YOU, HOLY FLYING SHITBALLS, for making some incredible podcasts for Look at My Hands and for Queen of Spades!!! If you haven't seen those, please check them out, they're completely awesome and I spent the entire time listening to them flailing and going HOLY SHIT HOLY SHIT HOLY SHIT, THIS IS WHAT MY THING SOUNDS LIKE??? OUT LOUD???? IN A HUMAN VOICE???????
> 
> Next up, happy holidays! I completely underestimated how much time it would take for travel/family stuff, which is why this is so much later than I wanted it. But, hey, here it is, and we're finally on the home stretch! One chapter to go!
> 
> Hope you all enjoy!! THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR READING AND FOR LEAVING ALL YOUR LOVELY KUDOS/COMMENTS. YOU MAKE ME FEEL ALL WARM AND SMOOSHY INSIDE, LIKE THE PIECE OF SHIT MARSHMALLOW FLUFF THAT I AM

Neither of them felt much like making a spectacle of themselves.  But if Faraday had expected there to be some kind of fuss about whatever he and Vasquez had been up to, then it was a welcome relief to head outside and find nobody seemed all that concerned.  Red Harvest, Goody, and Billy were invested in whatever they were telling the two deputies or doing a decent job at pretending at it, and the five of them did nothing more than glance their way, take in the lack of uncomfortable tension that’d been following them around, and carry on with their discussion.

They edged their way into the spontaneous circle that had formed, pushing in between Billy and Red Harvest.  Faraday was struck by just how natural it seemed to let his shoulder bump into Vasquez’s as they moved, or to let their arms brush, like it was the same as it’d ever been when it seemed like everything had changed.  “You work everything out?” Billy said casually, interrupting his thoughts, while on his other side Goody made enough noise to keep the deputies distracted.  Red Harvest cut them a quick glance, and then focused in on Goody instead.

Faraday and Vasquez exchanged a look.  “Think so,” Faraday said, trying to keep his face from going too soft.  There hadn’t been all that much discussion, in the end.  “More or less, anyway.”

If the way Vasquez was looking back at him was any indication, he wasn’t succeeding.  “The rest can wait,” he said, quiet enough Faraday could pretend to be the only one who could hear it.  Vasquez’s gift warmed him from the inside out, intimate and new but welcome regardless.

Billy nodded decisively at them both.  “Good,” he said, and it seemed that was that.  No one else brought up a thing.

* * *

They took a few minutes to talk the important bits over before they moved out, the sun just cresting the horizon and heat just starting to rise out in the scrubland.

Out of all of them, Faraday and Vasquez were the only two who didn’t have a clue where this so-called bandit settlement was or what it looked like.  Goody and Billy talked about hills and ravines that cut off sight lines, making ambushes easy to set and impossible to spot until they were already sprung.  Red Harvest mentioned haphazardly constructed huts and tents, permanent enough that it was obvious these men had stayed a while and were planning to stay a long while more.  The two deputies—Abrams and his friend—were the ones to bring up the labor camp out back behind the main base, where dead-eyed and half-starved folks in chains did work hauling and crushing rock, as well as planting and keeping an eye on what little livestock there was to support the camp.

Abrams wondered aloud how the smugglers kept their prisoners under control.  Even with sixty men or so up at the camp, there was no way to keep a close eye on every one of thirty prisoners at all times, not when everyone was so spread out.  “Surely that makes them difficult to hold?” he said.  “After all, these men used to be free.  They won’t just sit quiet and do as they’re told.”

Billy bristled.  Goody, conversely, went slumped and loose, leaning back a little and putting a soothing hand on Billy’s back.  “I can assure you, deputy,” he said gently, “sixty men are more than enough to keep that many in line.  Why, you could keep them with just three, so long as everyone learned right off that they’re not to be considered _people_ any longer.”

Most everyone shifted uncomfortably in place, remembering what Goody had done as the Angel of Death and who he’d done it for.  Nobody’d missed the point of the War Between the States.  Faraday supposed out of everyone, Goodnight would know a thing like that best—though he’d never dare say it to the man’s face.

“So, what’ve we got for specifics on the plan?” Faraday asked, once they were all saddled up and on their way.  Jack was eager to go, a loaded spring, and not trying all that hard not to champ at the bit; the feeling was starting to get to Faraday a little.

“Find Chisolm, Horne, and the rest of our boys, provided they don’t find us first,” Goody said.  “Free and arm the prisoners.  Then see if we can draw these bastards out a little and take them out a few at a time, rather than waiting for them to bunch up and go to ground.”

Faraday nodded; that seemed reasonable enough.

“That’s still not much of a plan,” said the unnamed deputy, who’d mostly been hiding behind Abrams and pretending not to exist.  “How’re we gonna manage any of that?”

Faraday shrugged.  “We can make it up as we go along,” he said, not particularly worried.  Vasquez, at his side, was already starting up that sizzling feeling he got before every fight, and it was less a distraction than a comfort and a reassurance to know he was there and ready to go.  Faraday kept shooting little glances at him and then looking away, since the whatever-it-was in his chest threatened to explode out of him whenever he stared too long.  Vasquez, the smug bastard, raised a lazy eyebrow every time he caught Faraday at it.

It should have been nerve-wracking, all of it, since there was the potential for disaster in the fight and with Vasquez both, and yet Faraday couldn’t quite bring himself to mind.  It’d work itself out.  It always did.

“I’ll let you be the one to tell it to your Mr. Chisolm, if it’s all the same to you,” Abrams said, wrinkling his nose so that his mustache pulled up high.  “He didn’t seem much in favor of running straight in without a plan.”

Faraday hooted out a laugh before he could help himself.  Vasquez chuckled just a beat or so behind, amusement a slow rolling wave sweeping out of him; Goody choked on a laugh of his own, Red Harvest rolled his eyes, and the corner of Billy’s mouth pulled up into a half-smile.  Both deputies eyed them, confused.

“Oh, no, he certainly isn’t,” Goody said, once he’d gathered himself some.  “But then again, he’s known us all quite a bit longer than you, hasn’t he?  I’m sure he expects nothing less.”

* * *

It was easy enough to find the place, and Red Harvest found them a good space to stake out their horses, out of sight and out of the way.  Once Faraday had convinced Wild Jack to stay put and stay quiet, they all moved in farther on foot.

Goody had been right, and clearly nobody expected them to come back so soon and with so small a group, because it was also easy to slip in close and stay undetected.  They got as close to the main camp as they dared, and then Red Harvest called a halt. 

“Billy and I will scout,” Red said, gesturing at the rest of them to stay put.  It was a sensible option, since the rest of them tended toward a much louder approach.  Faraday, Vasquez, and Goody accepted this without comment.

“Now, hold on a minute,” said Abrams’s friend.  “Our men are missing, too.  Why shouldn’t we come along to take a look as well?”

“I don’t even know your name,” Faraday said, “and I can tell already that you’d just be slowing them down.”

“What my friend here means to say,” Goody said, reproachful, “is that Red Harvest is an excellent tracker, and that nobody on earth is sneakier than Billy Rocks when he’s in the mood.  There’s no need for all of us to go wandering around, gathering attention, when these two can do it for us quick and quiet-like.”

The two deputies seemed to accept that, and Billy and Red Harvest went wandering off in the direction of the main camp, or so Faraday had been told.

“I don’t think that was what you meant at all,” Vasquez murmured quietly, nudging Faraday’s shoulder and speaking too soft for anyone else to hear.  “Hm?”  There was good humor in his voice and in his mind-touch, easy and affectionate.

Faraday leaned into the touch, just a little.  “I would never be so rude as to call a man a fool and a liability to his face,” he said, and smiled virtuously when Vasquez laughed under his breath.

When all was said and done, it was still almost an hour before their two scouts came skidding back down the hill opposite to the way they’d left, nearly silent except the soft scuffling of loose rock as it slid downhill.  The remaining five barely had time to tense up before it was obvious that they recognized Red and Billy coming in.

The two didn’t waste time; then again, they never did.

“The captives are out in the fields,” Red said, settling in a little ways up the hill and crouching down on his heels so he was still around the same height as everyone else.  “I count maybe twenty bandits and twenty prisoners.  Some seem familiar.”

Abrams nodded, looking decently pleased.  “Those’ll be my boys,” he said.  “Last I heard, nobody else from town was missing.”

“Well, we also found Chisolm and Horne,” Billy said, moving all the way down to join the group and crossing over to stand between Goody and Abrams.  He expanded on his report when Goody shot him a narrow, assessing look.  “They’ve got them tied up in the main camp along with enough bandits to about cover the number we counted earlier, so I don’t think they got reinforcements since yesterday.  The sheriff is there, too, and he’s still loose.  He was also arguing with one of them, maybe the leader.  Not sure what’s going on there, but there’s no way our two are getting free without help.”

Everyone turned, almost as one, to look at Goody.  It seemed, without ever really discussing it, that they’d all agreed to follow him in Chisolm’s absence, not that Faraday particularly minded.  It wasn’t as though he wanted the job.  And Goody had experience most of them lacked, even if it didn’t manifest itself quite like Chisolm’s did.  Chisolm tried to move them like game pieces, like cogs ticking together as part of a whole.  Goody, on the other hand, went to use them like a militia, deploying strength where it was needed most.

“Well, okay,” Goody said, taking in the way everyone’s eyes had moved to him with barely a flicker of an expression.  He covered by clicking his tongue thoughtfully against his teeth.  “Red, you can take the deputies here to go get their men.  See if you can start up a bit of a distraction, then take out whatever overseers you can.  Hopefully the prisoners will join in once you’ve given them enough breathing room.  Billy, take the rest of us over to the camp, see if we can’t get Sam and Jack loose to cause some trouble along with us.  If Red goes flashy enough with that distraction, we can take advantage of the confusion to even the odds a little.”

Abrams looked a little skeptical.  “What are we supposed to do against twenty men?” he said.  “And what sort of distraction can we cause out here?”

Faraday raised his eyebrows.  “I guess you all’ve never thought too hard on Red’s gift, have you?”

Red Harvest rolled his shoulders, lightning running up and down his arms like liquid, and ignored the deputies entirely.  “We can manage,” he told Goody.  “You’ll know the signal.”

“What’ll you four do, then?” said the other deputy.  “You’ve got the bigger problem.”

“Not for long, provided your distraction works.”  Goody waved a laconic hand, easy as anything.  “I have an idea or two.”

There wasn’t much more discussion; it was best to do this whole thing sooner rather than later, before anyone gathered themselves up enough to try to come at them or at the town.  Red Harvest trotted off, the two deputies scrambling to keep up, with barely a glance back over his shoulder and an eye-roll to suggest his displeasure at being left with the two men not a part of their inner circle.

Vasquez waved him merrily off.

“Do you really have ideas for dealing with this whole mess?” Faraday said, the second the two deputies were out of sight.  “Those numbers aren’t great, Goody.”

“Well, hopefully they’ll be spooked enough to start moving toward Red a little at a time,” Goody said, scratching at his chin.  “I figure that’ll keep them spread out enough that we won’t get caught in too big of a cross-fire.  There’s no good overlook for a sniper nest, so we can’t rely on sharpshooting too much.  So other than that, I figure we’ll have to wing it, unless any of you have suggestions.”

It seemed they did not.  “What do we know about them?” Vasquez asked, and he, Goody, and Billy went off on a conversation that mostly highlighted just how little they knew at all.

Well, what did they know?  They knew what these so-called bandits were up to, thanks to Sheriff Halleck’s big mouth; they knew that the prisoners were valuable enough that Red’s distraction definitely ought to kick up a fuss.  They knew the bandits wanted vengeance on the town, and they knew that the sheriff wanted Faraday alive to make a deal without involving his idiot son.

These men were thieves and traders of flesh.  They kept what they took and put it to work, not a single bit wasted that could be used or sold on.

How would Chisolm exploit that?  What could they use in turn?

It occurred to him suddenly that his own two guns, his two girls, were somewhere in that main camp, probably on one of the men.  He wasn’t quite sure how he knew it to be true, except that he did, and his own line of thinking led him to an infuriating truth.  Someone over there had _touched_ them, he thought, pissed off like he hadn’t let himself be before.  Someone had probably _used_ them, and just the thought of it made him shudder like a cat in a sudden downpour.  The idea of it felt as wrong to him as it would be to hand over his lucky deck of cards to any one of those same men.

Except—and the thought had only just come to him—in a way, he had.

An idea of sorts started to form.  He interrupted the others midway through yet another dead-end discussion.  “I think I might have a plan,” he said slowly, running his hands carefully over the handles of his two stolen guns and then tapping thoughtfully on his cards through the fabric of his vest.

He got three looks with varying levels of trepidation.  “Oh?” Goody said.  “What’s that?”

“Well.”  Faraday reached up to scratch at his head, smiling sheepishly.  “I don’t think you’re gonna like it.”

* * *

It all came back to the cards, his cards, gone missing and come back again.  Where had they been?  How had he gotten them?

His gift wasn’t a concrete thing.  It wasn’t something he pulled out on a whim, twisting the world to his will.  Like he’d tell anyone who cared to argue, he wasn’t a goddamn cheat.  He didn’t rig the game, just left his finger on the scales.

His power was also superstition.  It did what he believed it could.

Maybe it was time to think a little bigger.

* * *

He was right: they didn’t much like it, but they did all go along with his idea, which was an honest surprise.  He’d expected some argument, since suggesting he ought to head in unarmed did seem like one of his less reasonable plans, at least on the surface.

“We do trust you, _guerito_ ,” Vasquez said, mildly amused, when Faraday voiced his surprise.

“And we do appreciate the advance warning,” Goody added.  His amusement wasn’t mild at all.  “That’s all we’ve ever asked.”

“Right,” Faraday said, and let that go.

He didn’t mind that Billy wanted to come along, because out of anyone Billy had the best chance of handling the immediate aftermath of whatever disaster Faraday inevitably set off.  More importantly, he was the only one who could come armed without looking like too much of a threat.  Faraday himself had never really forgotten the hidden dangers of that pretty little hairpin, and Billy more than anyone could probably appreciate how rarely folks bothered to check for hidden blades when those few usual places to keep weapons were obviously empty.

Quickly, he dumped all his weapons, tossing his stolen guns off to the side like so much trash once he’d emptied them of all their ammunition.  If all went well, he wouldn’t need them again.  “How’s this look?” he said, sticking his hands in the air and putting on his best expression of wide-eyed innocence.

“Like you’ve got a trick up your sleeve,” Billy said, his own face calm as still water.  Faraday rolled his eyes at him.

Not too far off, a mass of lightning flared up all at once, bright enough to catch the eye even working against the glare of the sun.  The noise of the thunder was deafening, a rolling roar that caught and echoed between the hills.  As distractions went, it was a good one; there was no way anyone within three miles had failed to notice.

“That’s your signal,” Goody said, needlessly in Faraday’s opinion, since it wasn’t likely that anyone but Red was about to start up a localized storm.  “What’s ours?”

“Might as well make a tradition out of it,” Faraday said, starting to head out.  He brushed his hand against Vasquez’s as he passed and resisted the urge to reach out beyond that.  “You’ll know it when you hear it.”

* * *

Vasquez’s mind-touch sidled up against him as he walked away, sweet as a kiss goodbye.

“See you soon,” Faraday called, tapping his deck in return and sending out a little shiver and shock that only Vasquez would feel.  He didn’t bother to look back.

* * *

In the commotion surrounding Red Harvest’s little show over in the labor camp, it was simple as breathing to slip into camp, stick their hands in the air, and let the general confusion give their enemies enough pause to bring them in alive rather than shoot them straight out.

Nobody spoke English, to the surprise of that same nobody, but Billy seemed calm enough as they were led through a maze of ramshackle wood buildings, so Faraday figured they were at least headed the right direction.  At last they came into an open space, full of a set of little wooden cabins, and Faraday saw what they’d come to see.

There were only something like twenty or so men left around the place, all looking shifty and suspicious, eyeing the random flashes of lightning that were still sparking up from over the hill like they were wishing they could have gone along to check it out.  The others that Billy had seen were nowhere to be found; presumably they’d headed toward the labor camp and Red Harvest’s distraction.  At least that much of Goody’s plan seemed to be working.

Horne and Chisolm were up against the side of a particularly old and run-down little shack, with windows that were just gaping holes and a door that was jammed weirdly in its frame.  Two men with guns were keeping them in place, and though their hands were tied Faraday didn’t think they’d have too much trouble getting free if they needed to.  The two of them didn’t seem surprised to see Billy or Faraday.

The sheriff, on the other hand, looked mighty surprised, gaping in shock as he recognized them both.  He had apparently paused in some argument he’d been having with one man in furious English, while a second man translated quietly in the background.  The one he’d been arguing with turned a second later, and Faraday recognized the twisted scar high up on his hairline with a sense of impending doom.

“ _That’s_ the one you thought was in charge?” Faraday hissed at Billy, not bothering to hide his surprise.

“You know him?” Billy said, and turned some kind of expression on the man holding his arm, who was attempting to shut him up.  Whatever the look on his face was, it was enough to scare anyone off from trying that again.

Faraday scowled.  “You could say that,” he said.  The bastard was hard to forget, after all—even if his gift for bringing pain hadn’t been as memorable as it was, Faraday would still recall the face of the man who’d kicked him when he was down.

Scar the bandit recognized him in turn, and then things really got serious, because at that same moment Faraday recognized the guns around the man’s waist.

The asshole had _his guns_.  He was briefly, blindingly furious.

Not all that distant, Vasquez’s gift brushed up against his thoughts, _confusion-concern_ spiking just soft enough to not be a distraction if Faraday had truly needed his focus.  As it was, he took a deep breath and let it out, concentrating on steady reassurance.  _Wait_ wasn’t really an emotion, but he tried to get that across, too.  The last thing they needed was for anyone to come busting in shooting too early.

“Hey, there,” Faraday said cheerfully, once everyone had looked their fill.  “Figured we might just drop in, see how everyone’s doing.”

Scar the bandit turned and began hissing furiously at the translator, making sharp gestures at Faraday, at the sheriff, and at his two captives that Faraday couldn’t begin to translate.  He looked over at Billy, who just shrugged, equally mystified.  Well, it would work or it wouldn’t, and his lack of understanding of the Mexican language was hardly going to be what made the difference between the two.

“He says, why are you here?” the translator said, looking from Billy to Faraday before dismissing Billy entirely, which was about the best thing they could hope for.  Ignoring Billy Rocks in a fight never turned out well.  “You’re lucky not to be killed on sight.”

Oh, it was definitely working.  Faraday grinned with mingled relief and excitement, puffing up a little, but at his side Billy rolled his eyes and then made a little circular motion at Faraday with his hand.  Just get on with it, he seemed to say.

Faraday blew out a breath, but got on with it.  “I’m here to challenge your boss there to a duel,” he said flat-out.  “If I win, you all have to leave the town alone.  If I lose, well, you’ve got what you wanted.  Either way, it ends.”  It didn’t entirely make sense, but Faraday didn’t figure it really had to; Leo hadn’t struck him as the best of planners.  It wasn’t like they were letting anyone get out alive anyway.  “Only one person has to die.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Faraday saw Chisolm jerk forward, but Horne leaned over and mumbled something that made him relax back in place, no less ready but a little less horrified.  That was good, since there was no time to explain anything.

“A duel?” the translator repeated, stunned, and then shook himself and rattled off a rapid stream of Mexican that had Scar’s eyebrows shooting up.

“What are you thinking?” the sheriff said before anyone else could speak, caught in a shifty balance between confusion and mock-concern.  He pitched his voice to sound alarmed, familial.  Faraday was supposed to be his son, after all.  “You don’t have any weapons!”

Billy, who Faraday had first seen kill a man after putting down his guns, was probably getting a kick out of this whole thing, even if Faraday’s own version of the scene was a lot more flashy than Billy’s had been.  Faraday smiled, and spread his arms as wide as he could with a bandit hanging off each of them.  “Don’t need any,” he said, amiable, and this time the laughter that followed the translation to Mexican had a strange edge to it.

Scar the bandit said something to the translator, pulling a smile that tugged his scar tight and pale across his forehead.  “He accepts,” the translator said in heavily accented English.  The atmosphere didn’t go tense, like it would before most duels, because nobody really thought it needed to.  After all, Faraday truly wasn’t carrying a single thing that could hurt anyone.

The relaxed air, the mild strain of humor, suited him much better.  It meant nobody really saw a threat.

* * *

It took maybe a minute to set the scene, bandits scattering clear of the line of fire.  Billy allowed himself to be pulled to the side opposite Chisolm and Horne, catching Faraday’s eye and nodding once so that the back end of his sharpened hairpin caught the light.  He was ready.

Faraday, relaxed, focused in on the deck of cards practically vibrating in his vest pocket.  This was just another kind of game, after all, and he was ready to win.

* * *

Scar the bandit was armed, and Faraday wasn’t.  But that didn’t matter so much as the fact that the guns around the thief’s waist weren’t his at all—they were Faraday’s.  Faraday had named them; he’d learned their every eccentricity.  They’d saved his life a thousand times over, and they’d been with him longer than even his lucky cards.

Oh, the cards.  The goddamn cards.

Those cards had triggered this whole mess of a plan, because he hadn’t been carrying them when he’d left the bandit cave, all the way back when this thing had begun.  He had no idea where they’d gone, who’d taken them or where they’d ended up.  And yet, when he’d reached for them, there they’d been.  He’d done the like before, on a much smaller scale—pocket to hand, palm to palm, a little faster and a little farther than seemed humanly possible.  That was his gift, too, just giving him an edge.  But he’d never reached into nowhere and come back with something, not like that, not without meaning it.  It didn’t make sense, except—

What was his always came back to him.

It wasn’t like wishing up the dynamite, back at the Gatling gun in Rose Creek, except all the ways it maybe was.  He’d believed then it was need, that it was all his last bits of saved-up luck coming together at once.  But maybe the dynamite had also been his, in a sense, property of the town and its seven defenders, waiting to be used, and maybe in turn it had claimed him just a little bit too.  For him, these things weren’t impossible, just highly unlikely, and when it came to long odds he always found himself coming up on top.

What was his always came back to him.  He believed it, and so that just might make it true.

So—just because they weren’t around his waist, it didn’t mean they weren’t still his guns.  Just because they weren’t in arms reach, it didn’t mean he couldn’t reach them.  Hands hovering over his empty gun belt, he took a deep breath, gathered up whatever there was to find of his gift, and then tipped the scales.

The tension snapped.  They both reached for their waists.  Scar the bandit reached for Faraday’s guns and came up empty-handed; Faraday reached toward empty holsters, and came up with what was his.

He fired.

* * *

Two quick shots took care of the two guards hovering over Chisolm and Horne, even while Scar was still staring blankly down at his open hands in stunned surprise.  Billy’s hairpin whistled past Faraday’s ear, close enough to feel the breeze as it went, but the guard at Faraday’s back choked on it, gurgling as he fell.  In turn, Faraday turned sharply and shot the two guards closest to Billy, starting to run for the nearest bit of cover—it seemed the other bandits were finally starting to wake up from their shock, and Faraday didn’t want to be standing in the open when they started to shoot back.

The whole thing took only the space of a couple breaths.

The bandits all scrambled for their guns.  Billy, Chisolm, and Horne all took their weapons off the bodies at their feet.

“You think they caught the signal?” Faraday shouted at Billy, ducking and diving from behind one stretch of rock to another, firing as he went.

Chisolm was the one to answer.  “Faraday, you crazy idiot, I think there are folks over in New York who caught the signal,” he said, joining the rest of them in ducking between and around those wooden cabins and whatever other bits of cover they could find as the whole thing spiraled into a shoot-out.  “It’s hard to miss the sounds of this much goddamn gunfire.”

That was when Vasquez and Goody came running into sight, guns blazing, which Faraday figured about proved the point.

* * *

After a certain point, a gunfight always seemed to take forever and no time at all.  Faraday didn’t lose himself in it, always keeping track of himself and his people as he moved and fired and dodged.  Each moment was separate from the next, and nothing existed before or beyond whatever was in his sights.

* * *

But that feeling couldn’t last forever.

It could only be a minute or so later that Vasquez shouted, and the sound scraped across Faraday’s nerves like the teeth of a saw.  He spun, startled and terrified, and found Vasquez on his knees, with Scar the bandit’s hand wrapped around his neck.  Faraday remembered just how much it had _hurt_ to be on the receiving end of the man’s power, and the fact that it was Vasquez was—

He didn’t like it.

He started that way, darting under and around those enemies still standing, shooting as he went, trying to get close enough to help.  But it seemed Vasquez had it under control.  “Good try, _cabrón_ ,” he snarled, breathless and violent, and then his hand jumped up to latch onto Scar’s wrist so the man couldn’t pull back.  “ _Pero puedo devolverlo_.”  This time it was Scar who shouted, and then screamed, trying frantically to yank himself free but finding he couldn’t manage it.

Faraday had almost forgotten that Vasquez could give pain as well as take it away.  Vasquez put it to good use, gritting his teeth and pushing through it until he could shove Scar away and onto the ground.  Faraday had to glance away to jerk out of the path of a man with a rifle who’d managed to get impressively close, and by the time he’d finished Vasquez had already taken the chance to put a bullet between Scar’s eyes.

Faraday considered feeling bothered by it, since the man had touched his guns and he’d wanted to do it himself, but as it turned out, this felt just as satisfying.  “You good?” he called, still some ways more distant than he liked, ducking behind a bit of cover and just peering out the side so he could still see.

Vasquez nodded grimly, dragging himself back to his feet, and Faraday shot those two men who thought to take advantage of his momentary weakness before they could do more than start to point their guns.  “Good,” Vasquez called back, his own guns finally coming back up as he steadied.  His mind reached out, and that was a bit more honest, pained and off-balance but with a steady line of reassurance and affection.

“Good.”  Faraday refused to let himself be distracted, but he tried to mirror that last part back even as he looked away.  “I’m going to give Horne a hand,” he said.  “Cover me?”

Vasquez smiled—Faraday could feel it, like heat on the back of his neck, even without looking.  “Always,” he said, and Faraday moved before he had time to get flustered.

Chisolm, it seemed, had managed to get his hands free, and was raining down vengeance in a whirlwind of guns and righteous indignation; Horne had not, and was using Billy and Goody as a line of defense while he crashed around, using his brute strength and size to fight back anyone who got past the other two.  It was oddly effective considering his wrists were still bound.

Faraday darted over to him as quickly as he could, stooping to dig a knife off the belt of a body on the ground while Vasquez provided cover and distraction behind him.  Horne, like he knew Faraday was coming, bodily picked a man up and threw him across Faraday’s path, in the perfect position for a shot to the chest as he passed.  After that it was quick enough work to cut him free.

“Hold up a minute, Jack,” Faraday said, when Horne took the knife and made to charge off.  “I’ve got something for you.”

They had some cover, since Billy and Goody were both unholy terrors and blocking any easy path toward them.  Still, Horne bought them both a little more breathing room, bulling over the two men who tried to charge at them, and Faraday took the opportunity to put the cover of the broken-down old building at his back and quickly pull out his deck.

He tried to find what he needed so he could slip Horne his card, sharing luck around same as with the others, but the eight of diamonds wouldn’t show itself.  Instead, no matter how furiously he cut and shuffled through, the same card jumped to his hand every time.

Jack of spades.  Jack of spades.  Jack of spades.  He gave in and tugged it free, and put the rest of his ornery deck away in favor of the one card that meant himself.  He frowned down at it.  “What the hell—” he muttered.

There was a mess of noise off to the side.  “Faraday!” Goody shouted.  He turned toward the sound with a goddamn jack in his hand instead of a gun, only to find some bandit had slipped past the others and was pointing a pistol straight at his chest.

There was no room to dodge, and barely any time to react.  His hand jerked up, as if to shoot a pistol he wasn’t holding, just as the bandit’s gun went off.

With his back already to the windowsill of the broken-down old hut, the force of the shot was enough to send him tumbling backward, crashing through the window opening and landing hard on the other side.  He waited for the pain to hit, but when it did, it was just the normal aches of getting thrown back through a shower of rotting wood.  There was no sharp shock, no obvious bleeding holes—and he was familiar enough with the immediate aftermath of a gunshot wound by this point to know he ought to be feeling it if he’d truly been shot in the chest.  He shifted a little, and his ribs hurt enough to suggest at least a couple might be broken, but that was all.  He could live with that—would live with it, in fact.  After all, a broken rib or two wouldn’t kill him.

Someone nudged him in the back with the toe of a boot.  “You dead, Faraday?” Sheriff Halleck said.

Faraday had completely forgotten the bastard, which he figured was sort of the point.  The man’s gift was damn irritating.  “It seems not,” he said, cautiously pushing himself up and then giving up on the idea when his chest protested.  Something moved with him and clattered to the ground with a quiet metallic ringing noise; when he looked over, he found a squashed lead ball, flattened on one side and still warm to the touch. 

A thought occurred to him, and he brought up his hand to look. 

 _What the hell?_ he thought, would’ve said if he could only find the words.

In his hand, the card that’d once been the jack of spades had a matching-sized hole right where the little printed face had once been.  The rest of the figure had been wiped clean off.

Halleck seemed almost less surprised than Faraday himself.  “I can’t say I’ve ever seen a man stop a bullet with a playing card before,” he said.  “I didn’t know you were gifted.  Nobody ever mentioned a thing like _that_ , that’s for damn sure.”

“Well, last time I tried something like it I ended up dead,” Faraday shot back.  “Blown to bits, anyway.  And only for a little while.  There was this dead-walker who figured she owed me a favor,” he explained when Halleck shot him a strange look.  “It’s a long story, and why am I telling you any of this?  Isn’t—there’s something I ought to be doing.”

Halleck’s eyes narrowed.  “No, nothing much.”

“Okay.  Right.”  Faraday looked down at his card again.  Something was niggling at him, something important, just at the edges of his thoughts.  It prodded at him, like a prickle-burr just under the edges of his skin, and he reached for the cards in his pocket, ran his fingernail over the edges.  There were cards missing, he knew it without having to look, but that felt right.  He’d done that on purpose, whyever it might be.  It was what was still there that bothered him.

 _Eight of diamonds_ , he thought.  _Why do I still have the eight of diamonds?_

Why would he give it away?

Remembering felt like breaching the surface of a pond, like coming up for air after too long trapped underwater.  Noise rushed back all at once, gunfire and shouts and screaming; he gasped for air, shaking off the oily residue that was Sheriff Halleck’s gift.  “Stop that,” he said, trying to claw his way to his feet and fighting the sharp stinging ache of his ribs with every movement.  “Get out of my head!”

“Well,” Halleck said, and this time he seemed mildly impressed.  “That’s mighty resilient of you, Mr. Faraday.  Not many even notice something’s off when I use my gift, let alone fight it.  Though I can’t say I expected anything else from someone who shook off Piper’s power.”

Faraday swore, longer and louder than he ever would in polite company, except Halleck really didn’t meet those standards.  “I’m getting back out there,” he snarled, managing to shove himself up to a seated position, and then to his knees.  “What are you playing at?  They need every gun they can get, thanks to you.”

“I don’t think so,” Halleck said.  Faraday hadn’t noticed him reaching for his gun, but he had it in his hand and pointed at Faraday’s head before he could blink.  “You’re staying right here.  See, the way I figure it, that little card trick of yours won’t work twice over, so if I take this shot, it might actually stick.”

Faraday wasn’t entirely sure it wouldn’t, either, so he held himself still, one hand on the floor and the other still pressed against his chest, supporting his ribs.

But the newly elected sheriff of crazy wasn’t finished.  “Besides, I’d rather keep you alive.  I could always use a good bargaining chip no matter who wins.”

“First off, that’s a cotton-brained idea.  Nobody’s going to _bargain_ for me, I’ll tell you that much, unless it’s a matter of counting bullets.  And what’s to keep me from shooting you when your guard drops and then running off?”

“Well, there is the small problem where you haven’t so much as thought to go for your guns,” Halleck pointed out.

That was true, Faraday realized.  He hadn’t.  The thought slipped away as soon as it formed.

“You can’t just keep me in here,” he snapped, frustrated and not certain why.  “Someone’ll—”

“Notice?” Halleck said, smiling, and Faraday’s stomach lurched as the realization hit.  “They won’t.  In that case, there’s no reason not to just wait this whole thing out, kill whoever might be left, and let you take the fall for it in town.  Maybe they’ll all kill each other off, and save me the trouble.”  He paused, looking off into the distance.  His face was shining with sweat, though Faraday couldn’t tell whether that was heat or nerves.  “But as far as anyone outside can tell, you ceased to exist the minute you fell through that window.  If anyone thinks anything, it’s that you’re dead, and that’s the end of it.”

Faraday, still frozen, suddenly recognized that prickle-burr feeling for what it was: Vasquez’s mind-gift had never felt so distant, and what there was to it seemed so thunderous, so twisted-up and wrong, that it hardly seemed like him at all.  He sucked in a sharp breath between his teeth.  “Want to bet on how well that works out for you?” he said.  Carefully, he flicked a fingertip against the top of his deck, aiming to send one of those sharp little jolts through Vasquez’s card—

“Stop that, now,” Halleck said mildly.  “You might be wriggling yourself free, but I can’t say the same for anyone outside this room.”

A large part of Faraday wanted to just sit back and wait it out, because sooner or later the gunfire had to die down.  If he was a betting man—and he was—he’d put his money on his people coming out on top.  But there was another part, not insignificant, that was insisting that it was beyond cruel to leave things like this a second longer than he had to.  He couldn’t let Vasquez keep thinking he was dead, not when he could practically taste what it felt like on the back of his tongue, bitter and burning and _wrong_.

But the sheriff still had a gun pointed at him.

“Wait, what’s that?” Faraday said, letting his eyes go wide, and pointed off at something over Halleck’s shoulder.

It was hardly his best deflection, but Halleck still took the bait, turning to look behind him without a single suspicion.  Faraday almost felt bad when he lunged up and forward, yanking the gun out of the man’s hand and clocking him over the head with it before he had a chance to so much as twitch in surprise.

Almost.  Not really, to be honest.

Sheriff Halleck hit the floor, and Faraday practically swayed on his feet as his mind realigned itself, back to what it should be.  He didn’t know why he hadn’t thought to grab for his own guns or even his cards, but using the man’s own gun against him as a club had worked well enough.  Besides, it had a certain irony, as Goody would say.  He left the sheriff stone-cold unconscious where he lay.

At almost the same time, the gunfire began to die off, and Faraday collected himself enough to yank his cards out of his pocket, riffling through them with his gift sparking across his fingertips as he headed for the busted door.

There was a strange pause.  Then someone shouted his name.  Vasquez’s mind-touch went from distant and thunderous to close-up and sharp, a mix of emotions too quick and too dark to process.  Then it _shifted_ , and the full force of it slammed over Faraday all at once.  There was relief and worry, anger and affection, all tangled and raw—but at least it felt right again.  At least he felt like himself.

Oh.  “He’s going to hold this over my head for the rest of my life,” Faraday said to himself, more pleased and fond than anything at the thought, and put his shoulder to the door.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WILL ADD TRANSLATIONS ONCE I'VE HAD MORE SLEEP. IT IS AFTER 3AM AND I WISH I COULD SAY I REGRET MY LIFE CHOICES, BUT I AM TOO TIRED EVEN FOR REGRET
> 
> *Edit*
> 
> Probably should have gone for the translations right off the bat, because there's really not much. Weird for a chapter where large numbers of people actively do not speak English?? Oh well. Also caught like 12 more typos than my preferred number (which is zero. zero typos is the dream) and I am going to just continue to vacillate between shame and "eh, fuck it"
> 
> Translations:  
> cabrón: bastard/asshole  
> Pero puedo devolverlo: but I can give it back (more or less)


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WELL, HERE WE ARE.
> 
> This chapter took way longer than I wanted it to, and for that I apologize. I offer no excuses, though I have many, because really they all just boil down to me being an idiot and failing at adulthood. This whole thing has been a wild ride, and I've loved every minute of it!! Thanks to all of you who commented, kudos'ed, and just were generally supportive of me and my whole mess. I might have started this for me, but I finished it for all of you.
> 
> Just a couple quick notes:  
> 1) I do have a few short pieces planned in this 'verse, which is why the series will not yet be marked completed, but generally speaking the plot is done. This is it! Thanks for coming along on the ride with me.  
> 2) If you have prompts for me, in or out of this 'verse, please send them to me in the comments or request a contact method for me there. I cannot guarantee I will get to any/all of them, but I will certainly make the attempt.  
> 3) In the next day or so, there should be a comment!fic going up where I'll be posting explanations of everyone's powers one chapter at a time. First up: Faraday, obviously, because I think I might actually be driving some of you crazy by not explaining wtf is going on with that.
> 
> ENJOY!

The door groaned and creaked when he shoved against it, but eventually it burst open, and he stumbled his way out into the sunshine and open air.  There were bodies scattered across the ground, but even a quick glance was enough to tell Faraday that all his people were still standing.  Billy and Goody were shoulder to shoulder, Goody mostly pristine and Billy spattered with blood not his own.  Horne had found a knife or two somewhere, and was holding them like he was still expecting that something might need stabbing.  Chisolm had a thin scratch on his cheek, nothing all that serious but visible nonetheless.  Vasquez looked a little wild around the eyes, a gun in each hand and a fair number of bodies at his feet.

And they were all frozen, looking at him like they were seeing a ghost.

“What’d I miss?” Faraday said, sheepish, into the sudden still silence.

That got them moving.  Chisolm was far closer, but it was Vasquez who got there first, a mass of seething emotion, moving toward him almost at a run.  The others weren’t too far behind, talking and shouting over one another in a babble of voices Faraday couldn’t begin to pick apart, so he ignored the mess in favor of the one that mattered.  “Sorry,” he told Vasquez directly, because he was.  “I came back soon as I could.”

Vasquez shook his head sharply and got right up in his space; Faraday didn’t even realize he had one arm locked in tight over his ribcage until Vasquez started plucking at it.  “Shut up and let me see,” he ordered, furious and concerned.  He kept leaning in close and then jerking himself back to an arm’s distance away, and Faraday didn’t think he was imagining the way his hands were shaking.  “Where are you hit?  Let me see.”

“Hey,” Faraday said, astonished, and latched onto Vasquez’s wrists, trying to steady him.  “Hey, I’m good.  I’m fine.”

He winced as soon as the word came out of his mouth.  The look Vasquez shot him was half fury and half disbelief, but this time when he leaned in he stayed close.  “I think I’ll be the judge of that.”  He twisted his hand around in Faraday’s grip, until he was the one grabbing Faraday’s wrist instead, skin-to-skin.  His gift tugged sharply at something in Faraday’s chest, and Faraday sucked in a surprised breath at the strength of the relief that immediately followed.  It was unbelievably strange, to have the pain knocked out of him all at once.  His head spun.

“Whoa,” he said, dizzy, and then laughed.  The sound echoed weirdly in his ears.  “Ease up, V.  It’s not that bad.”

The ache eased back into him slowly as Vasquez ran a quick and clinical touch over his chest.  “You really are fine,” he said blankly, his hands freezing just over Faraday’s ribcage.  His mind-touch buzzed in the background, little pulses of _terror_ and _safe_ and _relief_ that curled around them both, and Faraday couldn’t have stopped the way he leaned into Vasquez’s hands even if he tried.

“No new holes,” Faraday told him, aiming for reassuring and missing, judging by the way Vasquez twitched.  He tried to move on, glancing quickly around at the others.  “Everyone good?”

Billy at least offered him a nod; the others were still staring.  Chisolm was probably the worst, expression strange and unreadable, looking at Faraday like he was half expecting him to drop on the spot.  Horne, his polar opposite, looked like he was just coming back from a midday stroll, pleasant and mild and totally unconcerned.

“I saw you get shot,” Goody said.  He sounded a bit stunned, and his face was a little grey.  “I saw you go down, Faraday, so what the hell happened?  It missed?”

“Not exactly,” Faraday said, reaching up to run his fingers through his hair.  The movement made Vasquez shift back, and Faraday had to resist the immediate urge to drag him back in.  It wasn’t the time or the place, but that didn’t mean he didn’t want Vasquez’s hands on him, steadying.

“This have anything to do with that gift you told us you didn’t have?” Chisolm said, dry as the desert.  “Don’t think I missed that little trick with the guns.”

Faraday wasn’t about to let that stand.  “Now, hold on a minute.  I never said I didn’t have a power,” Faraday protested, and then subsided when Chisolm stared him down.  That was probably not the point.  “But you’re not far off,” he said instead, and flicked the card that had once been the jack of spades up into his hand.  “I got lucky.”

The bullet hole was obvious and unmistakable, though without the printed image the card itself was meaningless.  It got him a few noises from those who had half an idea what it meant; Chisolm mostly looked confused.  Horne, oddly enough, did not, though he couldn’t have had any better an idea than Sam as to what Faraday’s gift was or how he used it.

Vasquez went sharp, scraping along Faraday’s nerves before he reeled himself back in.  “Is that—”  He cut himself off.  “Damn it, _guerito_.”

“Better it than me,” Faraday told him.  It was a narrow line to walk between matter-of-fact and his own surprise that it had worked at all, especially knowing Vasquez could feel it all.

“How on earth did you manage a thing like that?” Chisolm said.  “What kind of power is it?”

Goody fielded that one before Faraday had a chance to so much as open his mouth.  “It turns out Faraday has a little something extra to keep him alive,” he said.  “And he can share it around.”

Billy clarified somewhat.  “He’s lucky,” he said flatly.  Faraday thought that was a bit simplified, but then again, it wasn’t like he had much more of an explanation.

“That reminds me,” Faraday said, and went rifling through his deck.  This time, when he tried for it, Horne’s eight of diamonds came easily to his hands.  “Take these with you.”

“Oh,” Horne said, and smiled.  “So this is how you do it.”

“Do what?” Faraday said, a little too harsh, unable to help his immediate suspicion.

“You knew?” Vasquez said, more to the point, his mind-touch brushing up against Faraday’s rough edges and almost laughing until they smoothed down.  “About his powers?”

Horne smiled as he plucked his card from between Faraday’s fingers.  “I’ve seen it ever since Bogue,” he told them quietly.  “When he changes the odds, I know.  There was a future where we all survived unharmed.  Another future where we failed, and all perished.  And there were a thousand futures somewhere in between, a thousand ways to live and die.  I felt it when he decided, like a finger on one side of the scales.”  Horne nodded decisively.  “He raised us up, and the wicked went down.”  The look he turned on Faraday was nigh-on mischievous, though his tone didn’t change in the slightest.  “It’s a hard thing to miss.”

“You didn’t say anything,” Faraday said, finding the king of hearts and holding it out, just for lack of something to do with his hands.  Chisolm eyed it for a long second before he dared to reach for it.

Horne looked genuinely confused.  “Why should I?” he said.  “Would it have helped you?  Hurt you?”

“Not particularly,” Faraday said slowly.

And Horne shrugged, as if to say _well, there you are_. 

It was Chisolm who broke the silence.  “So, do I need to do anything with this thing?” he asked, skeptical.

“Nah,” Faraday told him.  “Think of it as a good luck charm.  Just keep it with you.”

“Right.”  Chisolm stared, looking from Horne to Faraday to the king of hearts, but eventually put the card away in his pocket.  “We’ll discuss this later,” he said decisively, stooping down to empty the ammo pouch on one of the bodies on the ground into his own belt.  “Right now, I’m thinking that Red Harvest might need a hand finishing what we started.”

“Right,” Goody said, looking abashed at the reminder, though Faraday didn’t think it’d been meant as any sort of accusation.  They’d all stood around for too long.  “I take it you know the way to the camp from here?  Billy can lead us in otherwise.”

“We surely do.  Jack?” Chisolm said, with a questioning tip of his head, and Horne and Billy exchanged quick looks before Horne took the lead.  The others fell in behind, and they set off at a quick pace.

Faraday stuck to the back of the group, and after a second Vasquez hung back as well.  Billy glanced over his shoulder at them, but let them be, urging the others farther out of the way without another word.  Faraday had to appreciate the man’s basic sense of decency.

Once he was sure nobody was paying them much attention, Faraday reached out and knocked the back of his hand against Vasquez’s.  “You pissed at me?” he said quietly.

“Furious,” Vasquez said darkly, but the prickle of his gift was anything but, an aching scrape of that white-hot emotion that caught under Faraday’s ribcage and made it harder to breathe for just a second.

Faraday nudged him again, as much as he could offer up while the others might see.  “Sorry,” he said again.

Vasquez just shook his head.  “ _Vas a matarme un día, guerito,_ ” he said quietly, and reached out to curl his hand briefly around the back of Faraday’s neck, easing the pain in Faraday’s ribs again and making something warm build in his chest.

Faraday didn’t know what that meant, but he really didn’t need to.  “Come on,” he said, gesturing ahead to where the others were widening their lead.  He didn’t pull away from the touch.  “We’d better catch up.”

* * *

He had the strangest feeling they might be forgetting something.

* * *

As it turned out, nobody needed help less than Red Harvest.

Faraday had never seen the camp where they’d been keeping and working their prisoners, but he doubted it usually looked anything like this: a swampy mess of mud and bodies, where hollow-eyed folks clutched at stolen guns and makeshift weapons and ground their would-be captors into the muck.  The whole thing sat in a shallow bowl of a valley, just deep enough that an inch or two of water had collected in the basin, and it’d probably be some time before the hard-packed dirt could absorb enough liquid to do more than turn the whole place into a slippery, dirty mess.  Everyone and everything was covered in a layer of mud and probably other things Faraday didn’t want to think about too hard while he was still walking in it.

Truth be told, it looked like a monsoon had hit the place, or at least a sudden heavy rainfall.  Red Harvest was in the middle of it all, taking care of the last few stragglers.  His feet were bare and planted firmly in the scant inches of standing water, and he was sending out carefully-directed waves of electricity that started somewhere in his chest and went crackling across the ground like well-aimed bullets.  The lightning actually dipped and dodged as it moved toward his targets, bright enough to leave curving afterimages that streaked across Faraday’s vision and made him squint.

Deputy Abrams and his fellows, meanwhile, were making themselves useful as well, helping the escaped prisoners round up whoever was still standing and pen them in.  They stripped each one of their weapons before moving on.

The six of them barely had a chance to take out their own guns before the whole thing was over.

Chisolm let out an ear-splitting whistle that brought Red Harvest snapping around to face them like he was being drawn on an invisible string.  He didn’t wave—Red would never be lax enough with himself for that—but he did offer up a nod and come trotting toward them, bow and quiver slung over his back and boots knotted together across his shoulders.

“How’d it go?” Chisolm said once he was close enough.

Red Harvest looked him up and down, and then did the same for Horne just behind him, before he bothered to answer.  Clearly he’d been more concerned for their success than for his own, which might be a bit insulting if Faraday didn’t also know their own record for this sort of thing.  “Good.”

Behind him, one of the escaped prisoners started shouting and kicking at one of the few would-be captors still breathing.  Without turning around, Red Harvest planted his feet more firmly in the muddy water and sent a little warning crackle of lightning sparking toward the sound.  He had unbelievable control if he could keep it from frying everything that the water touched, and it seemed the newly freed man took it for the warning that it was and subsided.

“Mostly,” he said after a moment’s pause, with a little twist of the corner of his mouth.

“What happened here?” Vasquez said, apparently fascinated by the swamp that had replaced what should have been a labor camp.  Faraday made out some bits of half-submerged cloth and poles, probably whatever remained of the tents that had been home for the prisoners, but that was all that remained.

“It rained,” Red said, flat and bored.

They all looked up at the hot, cloudless sky, down at the shallow pond that had formed around their feet, and then back at Red Harvest.  Faraday remembered, distantly, that he’d actually introduced himself as a stormbringer.

“Right,” Chisolm said, when the pause stretched on long enough to be uncomfortable.  “Sure.”

Red Harvest seemed to decide that was enough of an explanation.  “How did you do?”

“All cleared out,” Vasquez said.  His gun twirled lazily in his right hand as he eyed the mess still going on at Red Harvest’s back, a nervous tic he probably couldn’t avoid when he could feel the chaos of adrenaline and the emotions of everyone nearby.

“And all of us unharmed,” Goody said with a sweep of his arm.

Billy cut in with a sideways glance that proved he knew exactly what he was doing.  “All excepting Faraday, who—”

“Is fine,” Faraday interrupted, probably louder than necessary.  “We’re all fine.  We put down the leader, so that should just about cover it for now.”  The thought of Vasquez putting a bullet through Scar’s head would probably make him smile for some time to come.

“Well, I found your Piper,” Red Harvest said, looking pleased with himself.

“Piper?” Chisolm asked quietly, obviously confused.

Goody patted him gently on the shoulder.  “I’ll explain it all later.”

Faraday knew what he meant, though: Piper was the one who’d gotten him out of camp way back when this whole thing had started, all without anyone noticing a thing.  He had no memory of the man, but he knew the story of the Pied Piper well enough.  “Any trouble?” he said, trying not to move too obviously toward his guns.

Red gave him a look that meant, pretty damn obviously, that he should stop asking stupid questions.  “He won’t be a problem anymore.”

Faraday took that to mean the man was probably too dead to be much of a concern for anyone.  He regretted missing that particular confrontation.

“Then I do believe we’ve just about wrapped this thing up,” Goody said, almost cheerful.  Unlike the rest of them, he found it easy enough to put his gun away and leave it away, relaxing in place.

For once, Billy was the one to break the silence.  “Now what?” he said, looking around.  Like Faraday, he’d missed most of the mess and clean-up for Rose Creek, so this part of the job was as new for him as it was for Faraday himself.

“Now we go to work,” Horne said on a sigh.

* * *

They gathered up missing belongings, guns and clothes and horses, rounding up freed prisoners and new captives alike to drag back to town.  Chisolm, senses on high alert, tracked things down and settled disputes, seemingly everywhere at once.  Horne helped organize and keep things moving, anticipating needs before they were fully formed.  Goody and Billy took turns gleefully terrifying the Mexican bandits into obedience, despite the fact they lacked a common language, which allowed the deputies to help out where they could and collect their own scattered things.  Soon enough, Chisolm and Horne dug up their own horses and weapons from wherever the Mexicans had stashed them, one less thing to worry about later.

Red Harvest sat off to the side with Faraday and Vasquez, up out of the wet and the muck, and seemed about as inclined to move as they were.  “You planning on helping any?” Goody shouted up at them, somewhere around midday.

“We’re supervising,” Faraday hollered back from his seat on a waist-high flat rock, figuring they all had some excuse or another for staying out of it.  He had the ache in his ribs at the very least, which he didn’t intend to bring up unless anyone tried to make him do any heavy lifting.  As it got later in the day, the desert temperatures had risen, heating up the surface of the shallow new pond and sending it steaming.  It looked wet and miserable down there, and Faraday was not particularly eager to head down into it.

Vasquez, sitting on the ground and leaning up against the rock, shifted so that his side was pressed up against the line of Faraday’s leg, ignoring the grime.  There was filth and dirt everywhere at this point; there was no avoiding it.  Red Harvest hadn’t even bothered to put his boots back on, since it wasn’t like his bare feet could get any worse at this point.  “It’s an important job,” Vasquez called down, while Goody broke down into quiet cursing that barely carried over to them.  “Someone has to do it.”  Half-hidden, he had his arm looped around Faraday’s leg and was quietly running his thumb up and down the line of Faraday’s anklebone, barely enough to feel through the leather of his boots.

Faraday briefly considered telling him to quit it, but only Red Harvest was close enough to see and it wasn’t like he much cared.  Vasquez was being careful about it, anyway, and his gift was a soft press of calm and comfort, settling after the last few days of turmoil.  He didn’t want to pull away or do anything else that might make that ease fade off.

He tried not to admit, even to himself, that he didn’t really mind it at all.  He was sure Vasquez knew that anyway.

* * *

Eventually they were all gathered up and mostly ready to go, the old prisoners freed and re-equipped and their new prisoners bound and shoved up on horses to lead them back into town.  The deputies were already planning out arrangements for where to keep them all until the federal government moved enough to send enough U.S. Marshals their way to deal with the whole mess.

Faraday went with Vasquez and Red Harvest to collect their horses, all tied up safely out of the way, and to bring them back for Billy, Goody, and the two deputies.  Off a good ways from the rest of the mess, something started to nag in the background of his thoughts, a creeping feeling of something not quite right.  He poked at the feeling while they mounted up and got the other horses in some semblance of a line.

“Something wrong, _guero_?” Vasquez said, breaking off his line of thought, clearly picking up on something.

Faraday hissed out a breath between his teeth, and shook his head.  “I feel like we’re forgetting something.” Jack started dancing impatiently under him, and it was enough to shake him back into the moment.  “It can’t be all that important,” he said with a tip of his head.  “Let’s head out.”

* * *

It was hours before they were all back in town and sorted out.  Prisoners needed to be kept somewhere, and it wasn’t like they could just be tied up and left forever on the floor of the general store.  The newly released victims, half-starved and stripped of all their worldly possessions, needed to be fed and found places to stay for some unknown period, as long as it would take to fix them up and get them on their feet again.

“I don’t suppose I can just pass this whole mess off to the federal officers,” Faraday heard Abrams say at one point, and Chisolm actually laughed.

“You’ve lost your mind if you think they’re going to just swoop in and sort all this out for you,” he said.  “They’ll do what they can, obviously, but a lot of it’ll fall on you, same as ever.”

The deputy, who was absentmindedly passing out blankets and supplies with nothing more than a thought even while he spoke, looked oddly pleased with the idea.  “I’m almost looking forward to it,” he said.

* * *

It was almost dark by the time they all made it back to the boardinghouse and bar where they’d been staying, Deputy Abrams in tow.  There had been a brief detour for them all to wash off the worst of the mud and dry off a little, but for the most part, they were still tired and hungry and ready for the day to be over.

Horne hesitated just outside the building.  That should have been the first sign.  But none of them were expecting anything off, so of course, the first thing they saw when they came in through the front door was a stand-off.

“Aw, hell,” Faraday said, suddenly remembering what it was that had been bothering him for hours.  “Not this again.”

On one side of the room, there was Sheriff Halleck and the last three of his renegade deputies, hovering by the back alley exit; on the other, Leo Halleck and his friend with his typical green shirt were standing on either side of one of the tables.  They all had weapons in hand, but the whole thing was a complete mess.  Leo’s gun and gaze were pointed at one of the deputies, a weirdly blank-faced man, who had his gun trained on the sheriff in turn; the sheriff was aiming at Green Shirt, who had his own gun pointed at another deputy entirely.

At their entrance, the whole balance shifted.  The eight of them split their guns between the two groups, who fumbled at the critical moment as they tried to figure out who was on what side, until suddenly everyone had guns on everyone and nobody could start something without sending the whole room into a firefight.

“Now this is what I’d call a Mexican standoff,” Faraday said, just to break the tension.  He had immediately drawn on the sheriff and didn’t feel a moment’s doubt about the decision.

Chisolm wasn’t having it.  “Now’s not the time, Faraday.”  He looked the room over, taking it all in, confident enough to keep his gun dipping down toward the floor while the others held steady at his back.  It wasn’t like they didn’t outnumber the other two groups combined, anyway.  Red Harvest, near the back of the group, shifted slowly to the side, so he could use his lightning without anyone getting in the way; there was no chance his bow would be useful without more room to draw it out.  “What’s going on here, boys?”

“The sheriff here’s been explaining the way things work in his town,” said Leo’s friend, who had turned and twisted himself so he was facing the newcomers and keeping his body mostly between Leo and their group.  He didn’t seem all that committed to his threat; his gun was pointed at Chisolm, but aimed too low to do any real damage if that was his intent.

Goody, who was half-hidden behind Billy in much the same way Leo was hidden behind his friend, had a way of making even the most polite conversation sound like an insult.  “And what might that be?”

“He’s been lying to me,” Leo bit out.  “To all of us.  He’s working with those Mexican bastards, playing us all for damned fools.”

“We know that, son,” Deputy Abrams said. 

Vasquez was rolling his eyes; Faraday could _feel_ it.  “Everyone knows that,” he muttered, quiet enough that most everyone could pretend not to hear.  Faraday pushed down the urge to laugh.

“He tried to bribe us,” said Green Shirt quietly.  What was his name again?  “Wanted Leo to skip out of town with him, probably get ahead of whatever mob tried to form when folks learned what he’s done.”

“The ungrateful idiot spit it back in my face,” the sheriff said, red-faced and furious.  “But it’s not like the yellow-bellied coward ever had a spine.  He’s been hiding behind his gift for years.”

That did it.  If there’d ever been a chance of the sheriff and Leo working together, it’d just passed.  “Like father, like son,” Leo snapped back.

“Gentlemen,” Chisolm said, cutting in.  “Much as we appreciate the family drama, can’t we find a way to work this out peacefully?”

Faraday felt mighty sorry for the deputies that Halleck had dragged along on his crusade.  They looked like they were regretting all the choices leading them up to that point.

“I think we’re past that point, Mr. Chisolm,” the sheriff said, and then started rattling off a speech that Faraday mostly ignored.  He’d heard most of it before, after all.  Instead, he reached up with his free hand, intending to grab hold of his deck of cards, a nervous tic he’d probably need to get rid of someday.

“Keep your hands away from your pockets,” Halleck snapped before he could manage it, narrowing his eyes and shifting his gun to point directly at Faraday.  “I don’t know what you do with those damn cards, but I’m not so much an all-fired idiot as that.”

Faraday shrugged philosophically and kept both hands clear of his deck.  Not that it mattered, because he didn’t have his jack of spades anyway.  The thought hit him like a thunderbolt, sending a jolt through him.  It was damn stupid, he knew it was, because truth be told any card should do, or no card at all, except for the fact that the jack of spades was _his_ and that made it the one sure-fire way to protect himself.  If anyone shot at him, he wasn’t entirely convinced he could stop it, and that might make all the difference.

There was a thrill in that thought, almost.  Without his gift, it all came down to skill and natural luck, and it was anyone’s game.  The gamble in that was appealing.  He wanted to move.  He wanted to shoot, to end this thing before it drew out any longer, and he knew he wasn’t the only one.  Billy was tense and leaning in, a hunting dog ready to be let off the leash; Horne was rocking forward onto his toes and then back on his heels, fighting to keep still.

 _Wait_ , Vasquez’s gift seemed to say, just as it seemed like the tension had to snap, though Faraday couldn’t have picked out the individual emotions that made it up if he tried.  _Wait_.

He couldn’t ask why, so he stalled, because that was where he worked best.  “So why come back at all?  Why not skip town, get out while the going was good?”

Like he’d hoped, Halleck was perfectly willing to go off on some rant, furious and raving about what he deserved and all that he had done for the town.  Faraday tuned most of it out; he was far more interested in the look of tight concentration on Deputy Abrams’ face and the way Leo Halleck’s expression was slowly growing more and more sour as he took in everything his father was saying.

“I should have shot you all when I had the chance,” Halleck finished, just as Faraday tuned in for the last time.  He was practically spitting out the words.  “This whole thing has been more trouble than it’s worth.  I should just clean all this up now.”

“I think it’s worth remembering something,” Abrams said.  Whatever was happening was happening now, Faraday could tell just by the shift in tone from Vasquez, anticipation suddenly tight and waiting.  “Nobody does a thing without my say-so.”  He gestured a little, and suddenly guns were leaping out of hands, shells spilling on the floor as they unloaded themselves before turning and knocking their owners to the floor.  In a matter of seconds, the sheriff and all three of his men went down, violence startling and immediate.

Everyone still standing looked down at the bodies sprawled out across the floor.  “I’d maybe try that again,” Faraday told Abrams, when he rediscovered his voice.  He cleared his throat and tried again.  “He wriggled out of it a little too quick for my tastes last time.”

Abrams, always obliging, waved his hand again, and the gun clocked the sheriff across the face for a second time.

That just left Leo Halleck and his green-shirt friend, staring blankly.

“Are you all planning on giving us a fight?” Goody said politely.  The two quickly fumbled their guns away, and that was that.  They all relaxed a little.

“So what do we do with him?” Billy said, gesturing toward the sheriff with a tip of his head.  His hands had dropped to his knives, a not-so-subtle threat.

Vasquez took a slow, liquid step forward, one gun still in his hand.  “There’s an easy way to solve this.”

“Damn it, Vasquez.  No.  He should face the law,” Chisolm said, implacable, with barely a glance over at Abrams, who seemed to be letting them decide the problem amongst themselves.  There was a kind of strangeness to Chisolm here, a hardness that had worn away sometime since the fight against Bogue, and Faraday didn’t fully understand it.

“Bullshit,” he said.  Vasquez and even Billy were nodding; Goody looked torn.  “He’s a brainless coward who nearly killed this town, and he’s almost escaped twice now.”

“ _But the wicked will be cut off from the earth_ ,” Horne said suddenly, in that sing-song voice he used for reciting.  “ _And the treacherous will be uprooted from it_.”   He shrugged, and then mimed a noose around his neck.  “He’ll get what he deserves.”

Since Horne was about the only one who could about guarantee a thing like that, it gave them a moment’s pause.  “Alright,” Chisolm said.  “So we lock him up for now.  There’s no need to go executing the man ourselves.”

“We might have to, Sam,” Faraday pointed out, not moving at all to hold Vasquez back, though from where he was standing it would be easy enough.  Up until the moment Vasquez aimed his guns, the moment his mind-gift went sizzling-sharp and resolved, everything was still just fine.  “There’s no guarantee we can _keep_ him locked up, not if he can make us all forget he’s done something wrong the minute we turn our backs.”

“The Marshals can deal with it,” Chisolm said, though even he sounded a little unsure.  Faraday knew Chisolm didn’t have a problem with killing in general, so long as it was necessary, but a man with his morals would have more of a problem than most about killing an unconscious man in cold blood.  Maybe that was all it was.  Faraday wished someone had come clean about what had gone down between Chisolm, Mrs. Cullen, and Bogue back in Rose Creek, since maybe that would make it a little clearer.

Goody made a strange sound.  “That’s all well and good, Sam, but they’re not wrong.  Can we even keep hold of him long enough for the Marshals to get to town?  We can hardly afford to let him go running free to cause trouble all over again.”

There was an awkward moment of silence where everyone considered that.

“He can’t work his powers on me,” Leo said abruptly, looking down at his father with something that wouldn’t let itself be shame, not with the way he was tipping up his chin and firming up his jaw. 

Abrams frowned.  “What are you saying, son?”

“I can make sure you hold him until the Marshals come.”

Faraday was glad he wasn’t the only one giving the kid a sideways look.  He didn’t exactly have the best track record, after all, or the best reputation with folks in town.

Leo looked a little shifty, staring off at a patch of floor, but held his ground.  “Look,” he said, “I might have made—a few mistakes.”  Faraday snorted, and quickly turned the sound into a cough when Vasquez elbowed him gently in the side, too low to aggravate his ribs.  “But I’d never let him carry on like he was if I’d known what he was doing.”

Chisolm slid nice and easy into the role of the big, bad lawman.  “You expect us to believe you didn’t have a clue what he was up to?”

“He said some things, sometimes, if he’d been drinking,” Leo allowed.  “But I’d usually had a drink or two myself.  I never put much stock in it.”

Chisolm just stared him down, unconvinced.

Leo’s friend, whose name had gone clear out of Faraday’s head, turned to Vasquez and spoke up.  “ _Está borracho y estúpido a veces, pero no quiere que nadie muera por él_.  _No sabíamos._ ”

Everyone was watching the conversation intently, but only Vasquez seemed to understand what was being said.  “ _De verdad?_ ” he said, narrowing his eyes.  His mind-touch went focused and intent, putting them all a little on edge.  “ _Por qué debería creerte_?”

“ _No te he mentido._ ”  The man nodded firmly and didn’t hesitate.  “ _No sabíamos lo que estábamos empezando_.  _Pero lo arreglaremos._ ”  It sounded sure, even if Faraday hadn’t the slightest clue what was being said.

For some reason, it made Vasquez grin, coyote-sly, all that sharpness and tension sliding out of his mind-touch until only the wry humor was left.  “ _Nosotros_?”

“Like you have room to talk,” the man said, irritated, but when everyone’s gazes went sharp, he seemed to realize he had switched back to English.  He flushed.  “Uh.”

“Well?” Chisolm said finally, when all Vasquez did was laugh.

Vasquez just shrugged, but not before he shot a quick glance over at Faraday, with a look like he was sharing a secret.  Faraday smiled helplessly back, for all he didn’t have a clue what it meant.  “It’s fine, Sam,” Vasquez told him.  “Probably.”

“What do you think, sheriff?” Horne asked Abrams quietly.

Abrams stumbled for a second with the title before he visibly shook it off and continued.  “Way I figure it, he’s guilty of being an idiot, but not much else,” he said, rolling his eyes.  “It’s not exactly a crime in these parts.”

“Thanks,” Leo muttered under his breath, and then continued at a normal volume.  “I’ll keep him here, and then get out of town.  I won’t bother anyone in these parts again.”

Billy rolled his eyes, leaning over to mutter something into Goody’s ear that made the man stifle a laugh into his sleeve.

“Or you could stay,” Chisolm said, deceptively mild, ignoring the byplay and watching Leo like a cat watched a mouse.  “Fix some of what your daddy broke.”

For the first time, Leo Halleck lifted his gaze up from the floor and fixed it on each of them in turn.  Faraday braced himself for the creeping wrongness of the man’s gift, felt Vasquez do the same at his side, except nothing came, and Leo’s eyes moved on.  At last he ended up looking at Abrams, each staring the other down.  Faraday could practically see Leo’s pride bending enough for him to pry his mouth open and speak.  “If they’ll have me,” he said, stiff.

Abrams’ mustache twitched, only barely hiding his smile.  “We could always use another couple hands.”

In the background, Halleck’s friend startled, though nobody else seemed much surprised at the implication he’d be staying on too.

“And you’re fine with that?” Leo said to Abrams, looking back over at his friend, who didn’t offer any sign that Faraday could see.  Leo still turned back around and firmed up his resolve.  “You don’t have a problem with us sticking around.”

“You’re still _un cabrón_ ,” Vasquez said, casual as anything.  His mind-touch was practically itching for the man to take up the challenge.  “Nobody is forgetting that.  But I think you can make yourself useful.”

Leo eyed him darkly, but apparently he wasn’t stupid enough to pick another fight.  He’d seen enough of Vasquez in a brawl to last a lifetime, or so Faraday assumed.

“Well, I think that just about wraps it up,” Faraday said brightly, finally relaxing into a slouch that let him lean back on the table behind him, taking weight off his bum leg and pressure off his ribs all at once.  That nagging insistence that something was off had finally gone, and he was taking it to mean there weren’t going to be any more nasty little surprises lurking in dark corners.  “Anyone else want a drink?”

* * *

Abrams called in some others to take the former sheriff somewhere out of the way, where Leo could keep an eye on him, and then it was just the seven of them and the deputy himself left in the bar, everything finally— _finally_ —solved.

“So what’s your plan now, Mr. Chisolm?” Abrams said, looking over their little group.  “Are you all going to stay in town a while?”

Chisolm was already shaking his head.  “Figure we should be moving on,” he said.  “We hadn’t planned on staying so long in the first place.”

“I don’t know,” Goody said, looking a little too innocent.  “It’s getting pretty late, Sam.  We could at least stay one more night, head out in the morning.”

Chisolm sighed, and looked around for support he probably wasn’t going to find; Billy and Goody had their own plans, Horne looked in need of a good night’s sleep, and Red Harvest wasn’t even bothering to pretend that he much cared either way.  Red would survive just as well on the ground as he would in a bed upstairs.

As for Faraday, well, he certainly wasn’t planning to say no to one last night in a room with a door that shut and locked.  Vasquez, pressed up along his right side, was radiating a tentative _something_ that Faraday figured only he could feel, since it’d be damn awkward otherwise.  Faraday bumped their elbows together as a sort of confirmation.

Chisolm looked between Billy and Goody, and then between Faraday and Vasquez like something was just beginning to register.  He threw up his hands.  “Oh, hell,” he said, and it came out far more fondly than he had probably intended.  “Why not?”

* * *

They waited a bit for the others to head off on their own business, but then they moved upstairs together, working off some silent agreement.  The door to Faraday’s room shut heavily behind them, leaving Faraday alone with Vasquez for the first time in what felt like years.  “So,” Faraday said, uncertain, shifting a little on his heels.

Vasquez smiled at him, loose and easy.  “So.”

“Long day.”  Faraday twitched as soon as the words came out of his mouth.  They’d never been much for small talk.

At least it got him a raised eyebrow and a rush of amusement that sparked his own sense of humor, until it was all he could do not to laugh.  All the nerves and uncertainty ran out of him, because this—it was easiest thing in the world to stand here and watch Vasquez watching him, to know what came next.  What with the constant heat Vasquez was broadcasting in his direction, there was no room to doubt they were on the same page.

And there it was again, that bright-white knot of emotion behind his breastbone.  Maybe one day he’d be used to it enough to call it by name.

“ _Por supuesto_ ,” Vasquez said, still smiling, and took a slow step in, obvious enough that Faraday couldn’t mistake his intent.  Something hot bloomed in his belly, something Vasquez caught and mirrored back at him.  “Is this really what you want to do now, _querido_?  Talk about our day?”  It was hardly a real question at all, a challenge and a laugh tucked in at the edges.

“Hm.  Not sure,” Faraday said, and cocked a hip.  He’d never been one to turn down a dare.  “We could have a game of cards?”

That got him a laugh.  “ _Oye_ , no,” Vasquez said, taking another step closer, and then another.  “I don’t think any of us are stupid enough to risk poker with you anymore.”

They were right up in each other’s space now, close enough that it was killing him not to reach out and touch, but that wasn’t the way this game was being played.  Something bright and shivering was caught in his hands, between his shoulder blades; it felt a little like his gift, like weeks of good luck and good weather, all sunshine and aces high.  But he didn’t need cards, didn’t need his gift at all for once.  “Checkers, then?” Faraday said, laughing a little himself.

“No, I don’t think so.”  This time, when Vasquez stepped forward, Faraday took a half step back himself, so that his knees hit the edge of the bed.

Vasquez leaned in, Faraday leaned back, and they both went down to the mattress together.  Flat on his back, with Vasquez bracketing him in, Faraday should have felt trapped, should have felt like running, but there wasn’t anything of the sort.  He was exactly where he wanted to be.  “If you wanted a nap, you could’ve just said.”

Vasquez ignored him, but then again they both knew Faraday had meant something else entirely.  “Yes?” Vasquez asked, only an inch away, just like he had what felt like ages ago and somehow only this morning.  He hadn’t touched.  He wouldn’t, Faraday knew, unless he was certain Faraday wanted it too.

Maybe one day he’d realize he didn’t need to ask, not when it was a sure thing.  _I’m keeping you,_ he thought fiercely, firm and secure, and believed it with every inch of skill and luck and gift available to him.  If he believed enough, then it had to come true.  _I’m keeping you_.  “Come here already,” Faraday told him, reaching up for himself, and didn’t smile because it was hard to kiss a man properly when he was smiling.

Judging from the way Vasquez curved around him with body and hands and mind-touch, all prickling affection and heat, maybe he was thinking the same thing too.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Posting this at 4:20 AM, so again, no editing and no translations until after sleep. If you thought the end of November and NaNoWriMo would suddenly improve my sense of quality control, you would be very very wrong.
> 
> *EDIT*
> 
> Okay, I live! Why do I make the choices I make??? Anyway, here are this chapter's translations:  
> Vas a matarme un día: You're going to kill me one day  
> Está borracho y estúpido a veces, pero no quiere que nadie muera por él. No sabíamos: He's drunk and stupid sometimes, but he doesn't want anyone to die for him. We didn't know.  
> De verdad: really?  
> Por qué debería creerte?: why should I believe you?  
> No te he mentido: I haven't lied to you  
> No sabíamos lo que estábamos empezando. Pero lo arreglaremos: We didn't know what we were starting. But we will fix it.  
> Nosotros?: We?  
> un cabron: dumbass, bastard, asshole. insert multi-use invective of your choice here  
> por supuesto: of course  
> querido: sweetheart
> 
>  
> 
> And that's it! Thanks for your patience! ;D

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [[Podfic] Trust Falls and Probability Exercises](https://archiveofourown.org/works/8678425) by [MistMarauder](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MistMarauder/pseuds/MistMarauder)
  * [our doubts are traitors](https://archiveofourown.org/works/9409733) by [astoryaboutwar](https://archiveofourown.org/users/astoryaboutwar/pseuds/astoryaboutwar)




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